(Im)mature for Your Age

I want to preface everything I’m about to say by proclaiming my love for Sister and Stepmother, but…

There are some things about Sister that bug the crap out of me. And most of them are tied to her inability to act her age.

Age: 9 and ½

Offenses: drinking out of sippy cups, having to have special food made for her because she refuses to eat what the rest of the family eats, not being able to use a knife, thinking her height is an excuse to not get things for herself, needing to bring toys to restaurants, talking like a baby, not being able to walk the 1 block to the bus stop alone…

The list goes on, but those are the only things I can think of right now.

Now, I realize that my childhood was very different than her’s. I had an older sibling (Brother is 2.5 years older) and a single Mother, so I guess I developed some independence earlier than most, but still.

By the time I was her age I certainly wasn’t drinking out of sippy cups or having my own dinners prepared. I was traipsing all over my neighborhood to visit friends with my only restriction being the time I had to be home (usually 5:30). And once we moved (when I was around 7) Brother and I were expected to walk the 3-quarters of a mile home from school everyday…by ourselves. I never even remember being allowed to bring towns to Church, so restaurants were definitely out of the question.

At the age of 6 I flew from the Dirty Dirty to the Big Apple to visit my grandparents by myself. At the age of 7 I (with the help of Brother) escaped from mall cops. Around age 8 I knew how to, and regularly did, cook myself scrambled eggs. Mother leaving Brother and I home alone for an hour or two at a time was not a terribly uncommon occurance.

Like I said, Sister and I grew up differently. With a single Mother who was putting herself through school (again) we were forced to be more independent as she had less and less time to dote on us. And with an older brother I was expected to mature at the same rate as him.

Stepmother is a stay-at-home mom and Sister is an only child.

Night and day, I understand.

But this morning when Stepmother left to do errands Sister expected me to make her breakfast. She balked when I suggested that she was fully capable of pouring her own bowl of cereal. That certainly wouldn’t have flown in my house.

So I gave her a step-stool and told her to call me if she was injured.

Returning to the Ville

Woah boy!

Saturday night was amazing.

No, it wasn’t just any old success. Success is an understatement. It was an unbelievably, ridiculously amazing smash.

As you know, I was wary about this night. The closer I got to their swinging bachelor pad the more uneasy my stomach began to feel. Upon texting Twin that I had arrived I also texted ChiChi. The text I sent her started with “I’m freaking.”

Obviously, not the best start to a long evening.

Some of my nerves were relieved once I got inside and was greeted with a comfortingly warm hug and a genuine smile from X-Man. I always knew I liked that man.

From there the festivities started.

First on the agenda, some pong on the table Twin painted.

Considering the success I’ve experienced at pong tables recently we decided that we could totally take Blue and Mr. Milly. We were wrong.

After people had their fill of pong someone bonged a beer and all the guests headed down to the water.

Oh, did I not mention that Mr. Milly and X-Man live on a lake, with water, a dock and a boat steps from their porch?

Well, they do. So everyone donned their skimpy suits and grabbed some floats for some fun in the sun. And this is where some of the annoying drama started with Little Girl*.

The word on the street is that her and Blue were doing it and maybe possibly kind of dating. He hadn’t been paying attention to her all day, so of course she decided to have a few drinks and loudly proclaim that she was going to swim across the lake (not a ridiculously far distance, but populated by rushing crafts) without a life jacket.

Everyone protested (thus giving her the attention she wanted), but she did it anyway. Strike 1.

Once the sun got to be too much (and everyone’s cups got too dry) we returned to the house for more ponging and bonging.

At some point we realized one of the guests (who’s name I never really knew) was missing. He was found passed out on the floor of the bathroom. It was only about 6:30.

No need to worry, though. We woke him up, gave me a few bottles of water and he finished his nap in a bed upstairs.

While he was napping Little Girl was crying in another spare bedroom. Blue was intermittently comforting her. And they may or may not have had sex. Strike 2.

At some point in the night Mr. Milly and X-Man decided that if we were going to finish the keg by the end of the night we needed to start taking drastic measures. And so the keg stands begun.

First, X-Man took his turn.

He lasted 21 seconds.

Next, after a little convincing, Blue decided he needed a go.

He lasted 6 seconds.

Then, after the birthday boys had their turns, Mr. Milly (who was manning the pump) turned to the person closest to him. That person just happened to be me.

So up I went.

And 10 or 11 seconds later (once I was sure I had beat Blue) I came down. Victorious.

The rest of the night passed uneventfully. We drank. We mingled. We found a Sharpie and everyone proceeded to get tat tat tatted up.

At some point I got a sudden, splitting headache. So I chugged a bottle of water, took an Advil and asked X-Man if I could pass out on his bed for half an hour. He, of course because he’s wonderful like that, said yes.

I thought I set an alarm. I’m pretty sure I set an alarm. But somehow, I woke up at 10am, still in X-Man’s bed, with a half eaten Larabar next to me.

Go figure.

Honestly, I probably shouldn’t have freaked out so much. Quite a bit of time has passed since all the shitty shenanigans of last summer went down. All the people that were involved (including myself) are mature and fully capable of letting bygones be bygones. And we did.

By the time I said g’bye X-Man wasn’t the only person to give me a hug. I got not only a hug, but also an invitation back from Mr. Milly. Blue, of course, didn’t acknowledge me much, but that’s always been his nature so I’m not too terribly surprised. He was too busy babysitting Little Girl, anyway.

*Little Girl- a ridiculously annoying and immature 16 year old girl. She’s chock full-o-mental problems, one of which is her willingness to cause herself harm (or pretend to) or flaunt her issues in order to get attention.

Blah

Without going into detail, I'm not having a good day. And if there was ever a day in my life when sitting at Starfucks with ChiChi and Twin,

smoking tigarettes

and drinking unsweetened iced passion fruit tea (for Twin and I)

and carmel frappuccinos (for ChiChi) would be ah-maze-ing, it would be today.

We've spent so much time and money there over the years, planning our lives and bitching about them.

I need to do both today.

I guess it's good that in less than a month I'll be able to do just that.

Suitors Abound

This weekend kicked my ass, hurt my liver, scraped my legs and burned my shoulders. If there was ever a time when I needed a weekend to recover from my weekend I think it would be now. Seriously, I’m far worse for the wear right now.

It all started Friday when Roomie and I took Westchester to the airport to pick up her younger sister—Jailbait*. She was coming down for the weekend to soak up some sun and get away from some drama back home.

She soaked up some sun, but she wasn’t able to escape drama. She ended up creating plenty down here.

The night started out nice enough. We went out to an Asian vegetarian/vegan restaurant I’ve been dying to try. Dinner was lovely as was the coffee shop we stopped by after.

A little later we headed out to a party off-campus with a big posse of ladies.

In the little bit of time we were there (it wasn’t my crowd and there was a bonfire blazing) I had an interesting little encounter. I was approached by a guy who I barely knew—Arch Enemy**—who began the conversation: “We hate each other, right?”

Doesn’t that sound like the beginning of a beautiful friendship?

It actually turned out to be.

My group of girls ended up leave the house-party not too long after and heading over to the bonfire. It wasn’t quite roaring yet, but some of my friends—Tucker*** and Blondie****--were starting it. And by the time we got there GoodMan was just tapping the keg, I was still able to grab a seat around the fire so I could drink my first cup with Blondie, and not too long later people broke out the drums. I even ran into Arch Enemy again. Him and I ended up chatting quite a bit and before long he was telling people I was his long-term girlfriend (we’ve been dating since we were fetuses, apparently).

Everything was going great…until…Cesar stood up on a bench and announced that, for whatever reason, PSafe had called the cops and given them permission to come into the woods and restore order. WTF, PSafe? They never, ever, ever do this.

This announcement coincided with Tucker and Blondie deciding to leave and get sandwiches, so I was planning on heading out with them.

But on the trail I ran into Connecticut who, in his usual levelheaded, take-charge Repiblican fashion, calmed all the fleeing partiers and convinced me to return to the pit with him. At which point I refilled my cup and refound my “boyfriend.” Once again everything was going good.

Until…GoodMan and someone else ran up to the keg, grabbed it and ran off into the woods. WTF, guys? I was still drinking on that.

That’s when Country made the announcement that, yes, cops were in fact advancing upon us quickly. This fact was proven when I looked over and saw cops running through the woods yielding flashlights.

My cue to leave. And leave I did, with a group of people (including Arch Enemy, Westchester and Jailbait) through the woods. We were forced to blaze our own trail in order to avoid being stopped, but we eventually made it to freedom and back to an apartment, where we immediately began drinking again. And where Westchester and Jailbait got into a rather heated fight. Jailbait, of course, was to blame.

Saturday “morning” proved to be quite hectic, as I woke up with just enough time to say g’bye to the Minimalist, run to my room, change and head out to the meadows to partake in an Easter Beer hunt with Tucker, Roomie, Westchester and Jailbait hosted by GoodMan. $3 for all the beer you can find. How else are you supposed to celebrate Jesus’ resurrections?

We ended up finding about 40 so I was sent out to get a cooler, blanket and food because we fully intended to camp out until we finished them all. 6 hours later we were burnt, drunk and on the verge of death, but we finished. And with just enough time to take a quick nap, dress, and begin drinking again. This time we went to a soccer party.

(Arch Enemy was supposed to be there (as he is currently trying to woo me), but he wasn’t feeling too hot so he promised to find me next weekend.)

After all day in the sun none of us were feeling our best, but we pushed through. Jailbait, though, did not. She acted her age by refusing to drink or talk to anyone (even though everyone was being perfectly nice and offering her drinks), but instead she opted for literally sitting in a corner texting for an hour. Then she called Westchester and demanded to be taken home. Luckily, Blondie was nice and sober enough to drive.

By the time we got back to the soccer house, though, the cops were sitting in their car across the street waiting to bust the place so Blondie, Connecticut, a random girl, and I headed back to campus where we once again took to the woods with some 40s for a bonfire.

The bonfire ended up being one of the worst decisions ever because I’m 99% sure it was thrown by a bunch of neo-Nazis (or Unibombers), none of which go to school here. And most of which head shaved heads.

Blondie protected me from their advances and we left not too long later. We ended up back at his apartment watching Fox and the Hound (one of my absolute favorites!).

I got home around 4, completely exhausted and vowing never to drink again (this week). Fat chance of that because I woke to a text from the Minimalist inviting me to help him and the guys kill the rest of the keg. Oh dear God!

*Jailbait-Westchester’s 17-year-old sister. She’s a junior in high school and sure acts it.

**Arch Enemy-a guy I’d met at a party a month or so back who, for whatever reason, I decided I very much hated. It was mutual at the time.

***Tucker-one of the leading Republicans and an occasional rugglet, who tucks in every shirt every time.

****Blondie-a cross-country boy with blonde hair, blue eyes and oodles of sweet, easy charm.

*****Connecticut-the epitome of an affluent, Northeastern Republican. He’s got curly blonde hair, which he parts on the side.

Fucking Alarms

Let me fill you in on one unfortunate aspect of dorm life that few people think about—fire alarms.

This isn’t high school where there is one scheduled fire drill a month, everyone files out in an orderly fashion and you waste a few minutes of class. No, this is college where there are no fire drills. There are just fire alarms. That go off at odd times. For odd reasons. Stupid reasons like someone burned a bag of popcorn or didn’t turn the oven off in the communal kitchen. When that incessant noise begins everyone in the building is required to drop what they’re doing and assemble in the parking lot. If you don’t evacuate you face fines. If you do evacuate you face a crowd of pissed of college students who have been made to stand and wait the 5-10 until the fire trucks come (even though the station is half a block away and it shouldn’t take that long), then the 10-15 it takes the firemen to suit up, grab unnecessary equipment and go inside to discover the cause of the alarm, and finally the 5 extra minutes it takes to make the announcement that it is safe to re-enter because there is, in fact, no fire.

This is a highly annoying process that I have been lucky enough to only have endureed a small handful of times. Then yesterday happened.

There I was around 11pm, innocently sitting in my room doing homework and researching what vegetables to plant in the upcoming month, when I hear the screeching of the alarm. Oh fuck. So I grab a jacket, lock my door, and file down the stairs with my few freshmen. As I’m exiting I do see a few people frantically running, as if it were a real fire. This is comical, but not enough to reverse my anger.

Once outside I find my posse, bitch for a few minutes, and begin the waiting game. 10 minutes later 3 fire trucks roll onto campus, sirens blaring. This was completely unnecessary. The firemen get their lifesaving tools and enter the clearing not burning dorm. 10 minutes later we’re told we can enter.

Considering it had been a week or so since the last alarm (for which I wasn’t even present) I don’t stay pissed for too long. I eventually go to bed, expecting a few hours of wonderful sleep before an 8am gym call.

HA! I couldn’t have been more wrong.

At about 4am, while in a deep, peaceful, bear-like sleep, the fucking alarm goes off again. I’m pissed the instant I wake up. Getting out of bed I find my pants and shoes. Roomie is trying to find her clothes by phone-light. I angrily turn on the ceiling light because, honestly, who the hell are we trying not to disturb? I stomp downstairs, gather in the parking lot and wait. While waiting I angrily listen to people complaining about their lost sleep and how we should get out of early classes in the morning.

Seriously? I think to myself. Grow the fuck up. Nobody, including myself, cares.

As you can tell, I’m angry and have no patience.

The fire trucks eventually come (only 2 this time) and the ordeal begins again.

It didn’t take too long, though, before PSafe stuck a head out a 3^rd floor window and announced someone pulled the alarm intentionally (not even a hint of burning bacon) so we could all come inside.

I angrily shuffle up the stairs behind hordes of the slowest walkers possible, and upon entering my room, strip off my pants and throw myself into bed. I quickly fall back asleep and wake without a hint of anger.

Moral of this story:

Fire alarms happen. They’re not drills planned by the school. They’re stupid people doing stupid things. Blame the students. But they’re not that huge of a deal. Keep some shoes and a jacket by the door and you’ll survive.

Thoroughly Modern Martha

This has been a thoroughly sweet, thoroughly V-filled weekend.

It started Friday night with Vagina Monologues.

Vaginas can talk? What?!

Pretty much. If you’re out of the loop Vagina Monologues is a collection of monologues and short skits that are re-enactments of actual women talking about their vags. Sound…interesting? It actually was. I walked away with a goodie bag of condoms and flavored lubes, a chocolate vagina lollipop and a desire to “reclaim my cunt” by wearing sexy undies and doing something dirty. So a very worthwhile experience.

Saturday was FINALLY a rugby day once again. Sadly, due to my newly uncontrolled asthma I was unable to play. That didn’t mean I couldn’t cheer on my teams (and yell quite a few obscenities) as they slipped and tackled in the mud. The men won. The women lost. We all drank. And I finally had to shoot the boot (for messing up a song). Luckily, I was wearing my rain boots so I was able to drink my own foot sweat, not somebody else’s. Lovely thought, right?

I woke bright and early Sunday morning so I could trek over to Starfucks (slipping on some ice and busting my knee in the process) in order to study. After which I spent a lovely afternoon laying in the Minimalist’s bed, watching Rescue Me and talking about which woman was craziest and which woman we would bang. Not terribly romantic, but enjoyable nonetheless.

One would think I would romance on the BIG day. The day far too many people are bitterly bitching about. To those people I say:

Shut the fuck up. Valentine’s Day was not created by Hallmark (though they may perpetuate it). It was not created as a way to mock single people for being unloveable/undesireable/ugly. If you don’t want to celebrate it, then don’t. But for the love of God and all things chocolaty, don’t ruin the holiday for everyone who wants to celebrate it with your constant complaining and woe is me attitude. Suffer silently.

I, as you can probably tell, adore Valentine’s Day. Not because I have a Valentine every year who showers me with handcrafted candies and roses and champagne. I had a Valentine once and I don’t even remember what we did. No, it is because I relish any opportunity to channel my inner cooler, more modern Martha Stewart. This year, I really went above and beyond.

I made my own Valentine’s candy. White chocolate covered pretzels, cayenne chocolate pretzels, white chocolate truffles, cayenne chocolate truffles. They were time consuming to make. The chocolate wouldn’t cooperate. I spent too much on supplies. But they can out wonderfully delicious, so it was all worth it.

I packaged them up in adorable little goodie bags for all my loves.

I decorated my room with cute little cupcake window gels. Because they were cheap and the little draddle window gel I stole was lonely.

I made my own cards. While the little packaged cards you gave out in elementary school are fun, I couldn’t find any that weren’t Twilight, Hannah Montana or SpongeBob. So I collaged my own. They were far cheaper (as in free) and not in any way annoying or corporate.

I’m wearing a pink shirt, pink bra, frilly pink undies and pink socks with little red heart-puffs on the back (a Valentine’s present from ChiChi a few years ago).

I helped Frenchie decorate her room. Honestly, it is bordering on nauseatingly pink and sparkly. I’m sure her roommate thoroughly appreciated it.

Frenchie, Westchester and Roomie-Dearest and I even had our own little party (in Frenchie’s room, again to annoy her roommate). We gave out goodies and played Secret Cupid. I pulled Roomie and gave her the softest little bear ever. Westchester drew my name and gave me a stuffed cupcake.

Adorable, right? There’s more.

It’s a pupcake!

And of course there were the usual plethora of candy.

Frenchie is gave out more equally adorable personalized M&Ms.

Roomie-Dearest gave me a cute card. (For several reasons, some people call me Hampster, so this was relevant.)

And for the icing on my modern Martha cake:

I’m learning to knit.

Right now it looks like shit, but it will improve. Then I want to make a pair of the warmest, fuzziest socks ever (hopefully sometime before summer).

But for now, Martha 2.0 is exhausted. I hope your Valentine’s Day was lovely. G’night, m’non-bitter bitches.

Fight! Fight! Fight?

For the second time in not nearly long enough, I feel the need to justify some very bitchy behavior on my part. The behavior in question occurred Thursday, but has roots much further back.

There is this girl, Chinless Witch*, that has a bit of history with the Minimalist. They never dated. They fucked. He may or may not have taken her virginity. He did treat her like shit, though. It ended about a year ago and she’s still not over it.

If he did take her V-card I can understand her still being a little sore about the situation. If he didn’t, then she’s more unnecessarily dramatic and childish than I thought. Whether her anger is justified or not, she’s angry and not just at the Minimalist. She’s taking her anger out on me.

Therapist says: women are conditioned not to be aggressive, especially not towards men. So instead of going against her conditioning and being outwardly aggressive, instead of passive aggressive, towards a man (the Minimalist), she’s taking her anger out on me because she believes that I replaced her, thus am better than her.

Well, both her and Therapist are right-I am better than her.

This past Thursday I was out with the Minimalist and co at a Thirsty party when the Minimalist got a text. Like all texts from Chinless Witch he let me read it:

“you should come hang out with coosie** and i because we’re better than kara.”

Oh no she fucking didn’t! That bitch did not just say that!

Oh yes she did.

The gauntlet has been thrown (using improper grammar and no capitalization). And after much fuming and making out (because apparently it’s a turn-on when I get angry) I threw it right back (though since I was texting on the Minimalist’s phone, she thinks it was him):

“Well at least Kara has a chin.”

While they may not sound like a good retort, it was because 1) she really doesn’t have a chin and 2) she sent two or three texts after that one about how much of an ass the Minimalist is and insisting she does have a chin. Apparently, I hit a soft spot.

My intent was just to put the Witch in her place and leave it at that. I had, acting as the Minimalist, defended myself and shown her that that type of behavior was not to be tolerated. I had also aroused my man and won some points with Cesar for my willingness to be straight-forward and hold my own. We all had a good laugh and I was ready to drop it. That didn’t happen, though.

The Minimalist kept egging me on and I’m easily influenced so more texts were exchanged. One, in response to her calling me “that freshman” included the phrase “wizard sleeve” used Borat style (which means in reference to her vag). Things deteriorated rapidly from there. She started calling. I answered once, she hung up. She may or may not have found out it was me texting her. She may or may not have started crying. The Minimalist and I kind of ran away from her at one point. Bad stuff in general.

Once the Minimalist and I got back to his place he turned off his phone and proceeded to teach me how to safely pull a knife on someone, just in case. He found that appealing, too, so needless to say the lesson didn’t last too long.

Wink. Wink.

The moral-I promise I’m not a bitch. I should have been the bigger person and ignored her and her petty behavior, but I didn’t so I wasn’t. Now, I think I’ve made my first ever real, justified enemy. And frankly, I don’t like the idea of that. Even less than that do I like the idea of my behavior having any impact on the Minimalist, even though he claims he doesn’t care.

The only good thing that came out of that night was meeting a yoga instructor and having some pretty amazing sex. Does that even out? I guess we’ll see next time I run into Chinless Witch.

*Chinless Witch-the insults say it all.

**Coosie-the fourth roommate, also known as the silent roommate because he’s always with his girlfriend. Also, during the P Safe search, his room was declared a health hazard.

Vengeance is Not My Middle Name

I am not an angry person. By nature I tend to be pretty levelheaded. It really does take a lot to get me angry. And it takes even more to get me really blood boiling angry.

Right now, I’m passed blood boiling. Hell, I’m way passed blood boiling. I’m practically to the point of being in the market for some thugs who are looking for a fight. And I rarely condone murder. I’m taking peace and conflict studies, for pete’s sake. But the circumstances might just call for a little old-fashioned problem solving.

My ass of an ex sold my camera. I’m not talking about a digital camera that I could replace at Walmart. I’m talking about an almost 30 year old Nikon that Father took all f my childhood pictures on. Taking pictures on that camera once it was passed to me is what made me appreciate photography.

After we broke up, as a show of good will and my desire to remain friends (as we lived across the street from each other and had a lot of mutual friends), I let him continue to use that camera until the end of his photography class. That class came and went and he still hadn’t returned my camera, despite several pleas for it.

Then one day, several months later, I’m innocently sitting in my dorm contemplating if I want to snack on SunChips or popcorn when I get a call from a friend suggesting that I check my FaceSpace. When I get on I’m greeted my a message from said friend with a link to another FaceSpace picture. (Isn’t it lovely how we use the internet?) In this picture was my ex-ass with the camera I love so dearly draped over his shoulder. At first I was relieved. I had heard rumors that he sold it, but this said to me that is was still in his possession. Upon further investigation, though, I learned differently.

He said, as plain as his lack of skills in the bedroom, that he sold it. For $15! An almost 30 year old camera that was still in perfect working order. For $15! Not only am I pissed as hell that he sold it, but I’m embarrassed at his stupidity for not getting more for it.

I’m furious. Beyond furious. Livid. If I wasn’t so angry I would realize how heartbroken I was. Every important moment in my childhood, from my trip to Disney World to my sixth grade graduation to the first and only horse show I ever competed in, is marked by Father pulling out that camera, posing me in front of a door or a tree or a Barbie impersonator and snapping picture after picture to be mailed off (snail mail, of course) to the relatives. I guess that explains my love of all things old-fashioned. From my small typewriter collection to writing postcards to newspapers and books over websites and Kindle. That camera was a part of it and now it’s gone.

I have a right to be angry, damnit! He stole it from me. He stole a part of my childhood. So I’m going to get it back. And while I’m at it, I’m going to hurt him just a little bit. Call me a vengeful bitch, but he deserves it. After this and all the other things he put me through since our break-up, he deserves a reality check.