Getting Real

I've been having buyer's remorse for an item that I can't return - my laser treatments. Not that I don't love my skin - I do! It's smooth and even. So beautiful. Unfortunately, the car went back into the shop, I still owe this month's rent, I had car insurance/registration to pay this month, and, (gasp!) I got a ticket...for jaywalking! $190!!! Even after I get my alimony check I'll still be in the hole for last month. Things are getting real, financially speaking.

I did have the chance to debut my beautiful new skin at my cousin's kid's wedding this weekend. It was at Wente Winery in Livermore, Ca. Ugly name for a beautiful area. I guess you could call it the eastern Bay Area wine country. I had to pay for my room ($93) and transportation ($117), putting me further in the hole. My cousin and I aren't all that close but her daughter married a rich kid and they invited, like, 600 people - everyone they knew, apparently, who were on the west coast and not away on some far flung vacation or basking in the cold wind at their Hamptons summer houses.

It was beautiful, as all weddings are (in one way or another.) The flowers were exquisite - peonys, roses, hydrangeas, stock, and dusty miller - all in the most delicate shades of peach, cream and pink. I snagged a couple of bouquets to take home and made four large arrangements which I've artfully scattered about the apartment.

The bridesmaids, all 12 of them wrapped in slightly different peach silk chiffon dresses, looked like tall, fluffy flowers themselves. Dinner was salmon, harcots verts, mescalun salad, and tiny roasted potatoes, followed by big slices of spongy white wedding cake filled with lemon curd and topped with a froth of ivory tinted buttercream. The dancing lasted long into the night, lubricated with oceans of wine, champagne and microbrews.

By 10 am the next morning, 27 people had come down with the flu. Today I'm queasy, but it's probably just the nauseating reek of dying flowers.

From the Headlines

OMG! did you read about that guy, Papa Joe Aviance, who lost a ton of weight eating from the '99-cent' store!? What did I tell you guys? It's an awesome place to shop, and it's not all about the junk food, either. You go, Papa Joe!

File this under 'what-the-hell-is-happening-to-us': Santa Monica College, where five people were gunned down on Friday, is about a mile and a half from my apartment. It's as if the 'nice-guy-suit' that most people walk around wearing is beginning to fray and split at the seams. I mean, violence is a constant, I get that, and stuff like this has been happening all along but it seems to me that more people are boiling over faster and bringing down more victims more often. Is is just me, or does it seem that way to any of you? So many people are unemployed, and a growing percentage of them aren't even being counted because they've just given up. They live in friend's garages, on auntie's couches, in tents in their ex's backyards, or in walmart parking lots in their cars. And those are just the 'homed'; let's not even start on the 'homeless'.

It makes me ashamed of my recent whining, and all the more determined to get a job. Or make a job, or something...

Namaste, Bitches!

Ok, just how did you bitches (and you know who you are) read 'homophobe' into my last post? I've had an onslaught of flack about Mark and my 'attitude' toward him. First, I didn't call him a weirdo. I said "we ALL" are weirdos. Humans, it seems to me, are all a little skittish, twisted, dangerous, and demented. Every one of us, in one way or another. Mark was very forthcoming about his fetish and I listened politely. I didn't try to talk him out of it or suggest a 12-step group. I just listened and nodded occasionally - that's what friends do. We support each other. Besides, Mark's not gay...exactly. He's maybe bi, he thinks, but he's not sure because his only gay affair lasted just a couple of weeks when he was in high school. Whatever...point is: as long as it doesn't include kids, animals or dead people I really couldn't care less who Mark, or any of you all for that matter, do the nasty nekked with.

I do, however, care who I do it with. And I haven't done it in quite some time. So I'm a little bit tense and snapish. Sorry. Peace out.

Blood Orange Pinkberry

Remember Mark, the former lawyer I met on the bus? The one who used to work for my lying cheat of an ex-husband? Well. he called last week to say that he'd remembered something about Barney's business dealings, something he thought I'd like to know. We met at Pinkberry yesterday. He bought me a Blood Orange frozen yogurt (with chocolate chips) and dished a little dirt about Barney. Apparently he was shuffling assets around while claiming to be broke while he waited out the statute of limitations on a few debts he'd stopped making payments on. The companies he was defaulting on pursued him, even started judgement proceeding, but he slipped through their hands like a greased pig. Mark has a lot of paperwork and notes and stuff. I haven't really wrapped my mind around it yet but I know there's something there that I can work with.

Mark and I talked about how our lives have changed in the past year or two. We used to have 'everything', or we thought we did. Now we're both taking the bus. I asked him about the transvestite thing. He said it started when he was still working as a lawyer. His job was seriously stressful and sometimes at work he'd have these panic attacks, which he had to try and hide from everyone. He'd always been fascinated by women's underwear and had a few pairs of satin panties hidden in his drawers at home. He never wore then, just took them out and looked at them every once in awhile. Well, this one day things were getting pretty tense at work and he felt an attack coming on so he went to the men's room and locked himself in a stall to calm down. He checked his jacket, looking for a cigarette, and discovered that he's stuffed a pair of pink thong panties in one of the pockets. He began to stoke the material and noticed after a few minutes that he'd calmed down. Something about fingering the fabric made him more relaxed. He started carrying a pair around at work. When things got bad he's just slip his hand in his pocket and stroke those panties for a minute and it would pass, kind of like a security blankie, I guess.

Things escalated from there. He started to wear the panties to work, always being careful to avoid letting any of the other guys see them in the bathroom. The constant feel of that soft fabric kept him calm most of the time. Soon he needed more stimulation to keep the attacks at bay so he bought a long blonde wig which he took to wearing around the house after work. He'd sit at the computer and stroke the long nylon hair while wriggling around in the panties. It was a short leap from there to wearing the stuff out in public occasionally. Anyway, it was interesting to hear him tell it.

What a bunch of weirdos we all are, us humans. I have no tips or recipes tonight. Just a splitting headache and a slightly peeling face.