In Praise of Older, Better, and Definitely Wiser

It's my birthday. OH, YEAH. Love me!

I'm 33 and better for it in every conceivable way. I know who I am more than ever before, know I'm equipped to handle nearly any adversity more than ever before, and I appreciate the days that are mine more than I ever have before.

Age isn't the enemy. It's a good thing. Forty's the new 30, and people at 50 look better than we'd ever have imagined when I was growing up.

I've known some pretty amazing people in my time, but one of the coolest ones taught me that age was a matter of the heart a long, long time ago.

When I was 13, we were paid $50 to spend the day helping one of my mom's real estate clients move into her new townhouse. Mrs. Chapel was 82 then and had just gotten her blackbelt in karate. She was signing up for a skydiving lesson at the time.

I remember when my mother died and a customer of mine from the bookstoke I once worked at, an incredibly great contributor to the Beat Generation, poet and professor Robin Blaser, asked me how old she was when she passed. I said 57. He looked at me, shook his head, and simply said, "That's too fucking young. Too fucking young."

Even if I die at her age, I've still got a quarter of a century in my favour. I'm 33 and I've grown up in that perfect point of time where I'm old enough to remember the way shit was before technology grew a head of its own, and young enough to understand how fucking cool technology is today.

A couple funny things say exactly how old I am. I was talking to some kind about six or seven years ago, and explaining how great I was at making mix tapes. "Mix tapes?" Fucking kid had never had a tape in his life. Not long after that, I was riding the bus when a couple stupid teenaged girls were yammering about music. "Oh, I heard the COOLEST new band last night! They're called the Doors! They're gonna be HUGE, just HUGE!"

Yeah, with some fucking smelling salts and a Ouija board, sweetcakes.

I'm "old" now. I don't pay attention to the new music, I'm just like anyone "older and wiser," I'm sure that good music stopped being invented somewhere around year 2000. Please, don't burst my bubble. I don't want to discover I'm not as hip as I think I am.

But THIS is my day. And it's Friday. And I have a three-day weekend. And and and. Love me. :) Say hi! I'll be doing a lot of writing in the coming days. I feel it bubbling up in me, like a pot coming to boil. It's almost there now. Stay tuned!

33 rocks. Rocks and rocks and rocks! Fuck numbers. I'm young at heart.

In Praise of Pink Slips

(There are topics I wanna get to, and I will, in the coming days, but for now I'm going to indulge myself.)

What a difference a day makes. 24 hours ago, I was sitting there sullenly at my desk, kind of loathing my existence. Today, I've got a paid day off, and tomorrow I return to the only job I've ever known that made me feel like I was part of a family.

It has been 12-13 years since I had a job with an asshole employer. This was the first time since that I'd had an employer that I felt was, well, unfair. I'm not going into specifics. It is what it is, and I have too developed a readership to go slagging anyone. But let's face it, not everyone knows how to manage. There are people who have such great personalities that they get overlooked for how they sometimes treat others, and they can be hell to work for.

I'm a big believer in learning from life as it happens. You can just dismiss things and say "shit happens," or you can ask "why does shit happen?" Everything I ever needed to know I learned from Philosophy 101. Why?

For me it makes life so much better when I assign value to all the things that go down in my life. For every failure, I try to learn something. And whether I want to accept it or not, I was fired. I failed in some capacity, and while I consider myself fortunate to have been uninvited from that particular party, there's a part of me that knows what rejection feels like again.

Do you ever sit back in your comfy arm chair, watching some talk show, on which is some woman telling of all the abuse she endured through her many years of marriage, and sit there, thinking, "Jesus, honey! Why didn't you leave?! At what point do you finally clue the fuck in and say, 'Gee, I think this might be a bad situation?' Fuck!"

Yet how many of us work every day in jobs we hate? Jobs where you know it's just a paycheque, baby? How many of us tolerate rude, belligerent employers who don't know how to sit the fuck down and trust us to do the jobs we're supposed to be hired to do? It's psychological abuse, really, when you work in a situation like that. But because they sign our paycheques and keep the roofs above our heads, we somehow feel like they've got permission to treat us like they do.

And I don't give a fuck what kind of job it is, what kind of pressure it is, it's not too goddamned much to ask that employees everywhere get treated in a reasonably professional manner. I'm not so sure that's how I was treated of late. Two people there were good, though. Pity about the unbalance.

So, uninvited from the party, I have to tell you that today's the first time since about... February of this year that I've woken up without this palpable fear of whether all the bills are going to be paid and whether I'm gonna have my integrity intact at the end of the day. In the spring I was just financially insecure. Of late, I was underpaid and treated somewhat questionably. Different scenarios, but similar results.

I feel like a fucking mammoth weight has come off my shoulders, is what I'm trying to say. And I'm also trying to suggest that, if you're one of those people working a job you hate, you really need to start asking yourself if the cost benefit ratio of going through THAT every single day is worth it. I mean, shit. I feel like I've just broken the water's surface and am finally breathing again. I had no idea those many months were taking the toll they've now so obviously been taking.

I always said I was lucky to never have really had to work in a bad situation. Now I have. I'm one of those freaks that likes having difficult experiences because then I always grow. It's my choice to gain from the situation, ain't it? So I'm having a good day. Friday's coming and so's that 33rd birthday. Older? Wiser? Fucking right I am.

I wouldn't have had the guts to quit without another job to go to. Getting fired was the only way that situation was gonna get resolved, unless one of the headhunter positions worked out. So my perfect record gets smeared. Whatever. I'm glad I'm moving on to potentially better times.

It's one of those times where you, the reader, gets to sit back and ponder your own life's satisfaction. Is it really going the way you want? Is it worth it to keep compromising? Think about it. Then remember one of my favourite sayings: Life's too fucking short.

Hallelujah. I got fired. Uninvited. Ha. And look, it's sunny out. Go fuckin' figger.

Good news! I got fired!

Heh. Yep, you read right. I'm happy I just got fired.

I hated the job, or more accurately, one of the bosses. Worse yet: It sucked the will to write right out of me.

Putting words on a screen's pretty fucking easy most days and I can do it in my sleep, but the GOOD writing, well, that comes from places that machines can't mine. When the mix is off, it's really, really difficult to get things gelling again. And, honestly, something about that job just killed my creativity.

And, being such an affable and good chick as I am, the folks I worked the last six years for are taking me back without even thinking twice. Not permanently, but "for a while" at the very least, and "for a while" is what I need.

And the moral of this story, boys and girls, is that when adversity happens, don't think about the fucking adversity. Think about overcoming it. Within 10 minutes I went from losing a job to getting another one, in essence, and that comes from acting, not fretting.

I'm a happy camper. I lost a job I hated. I'm going back to one that had me, for some weird reason, writing better than I've ever written before. Methinks I've come out ahead.

But the good news for you is, soon I'll be back to writing well. Don't think I don't know this blog's been off-kilter for some time. I know it all too well. I already have a couple fun things planned for postings.

I'd kill to hear "Ding, dong, the witch is dead" right now, 'cos it sums up how I'm feeling pretty nicely.

Reader: Should I Stay or Should I Go Now?

All right, well, I'm kinda AWOL these days. Part sickness, part sick of it. Just needing a bit of a slow-down with things in all areas of my life.

I had a reader question a week or so ago. Pretty short and sweet:

I was wondering what your take is on couples who have a peaceful, mutual breakup (stay good friends) and continue living together until their lease is up.

What, in a nutshell?

"Good luck with that" is about what I think. Good fucking luck.

Yeah, okay, somewhere over the rainbow, bluebirds sing and rivers are made of chocolate, and couples who break up really truly can be friends. Yes, Toto, they can! Even in Kansas!

In my twisted little worldview, though, friends after breakup is a whole lot easier said than done. There's all those weird little remembrances you have to get over. Like, "watching a movie" means a whole other thing if you're "just friends."

"You mean I can't start nibbling your torso when there's a boring bit?"

Well, there's always popcorn, honey.

We're human beings. We're silly things with opposable thumbs and convoluted ideas on what constitutes civilization. We want to pretend we're all smart and brilliant when it comes to problem resolution. The problem is, this ain't no problem to resolve. The death of a relationship is, well, a death.

It dies. Six feet down, all bets off. It's not a simple change of state. It's a change of being. You used to fuck in frenzies. You told each other everything. You had dreams and goals and plans. And then, one day, it all went poof in a little whisp of smoke. You sorta saw it coming, yet there you stood still in a state of utter disbelief.

Because that's how it all goes.

Now you want to think that a little piece of paper that says you have a lease is going to be enough to keep it on an even keel. Let's hope you're right. In my world, it just doesn't tend to work out that well.

I'm a smart person with big brains and long memory, and pushing aside a past in order to have a present seems to be one of those equations I have a difficult time solving. Not that I wouldn't try to solve it.

But surprises happens. Luck tends to play its hand. And sometimes odds get defied. Me, I err on the side of probability and statistics. Numbers meaning what they do and all.

And Then It Was Sunny.

Y'know that old cliche, "I felt like I had a new lease on life"?

Welcome to my Friday morning. I rolled out of bed, bitter about a bad night's sleep, got up, grabbed a glass of water, and realized: Wow, I feel almost normal. Yep, the flu / cold that sunk its teeth in deep has finally given up some of its grip.

You know, being sick isn't all bad. Catching a three-week thing sucks, but a four- or five-day bug? Not a bad thing at all.

We're all so stuck in our gotta-do's that we tend to forget about choice. We get caught up in these lives of supposed obligation and occupation that we forget there's a bigger picture out there.

I've slept a lot, excluding last night, since Sunday. Probably 50% of my week was spent under covers, out of commission. Had you asked me Saturday if I was planning on sleeping in Sunday, I'd have told you "I don't have the time." I'd have said I was planning on having late nights all week long -- and that I was planning on getting into the habit of setting my alarm clock for earlier than necessary, too. I felt my days weren't my own. Obligation engulfed me from every angle.

And then I got sick. Necessity is the mother of action, too. I turned off the alarm clock, stopped cleaning up after myself, ignored the chaos of my universe, and became still.

Last night I had a moment. I had turned off the TV early, thinking an early night necessary to make it through my day. Then it was dark. My whole place, just dark. And silent. I sat there in the blackness for a while, trying to remember the last time I felt something peaceful like that. It's been a long time. A long, long time.

Some days a little time can feel like a lot of forever. That 10 minutes of utter silence helped me stumble upon a remembrance of another cliche. "Why do I keep hitting my head with a hammer? Because it feels so good when I stop."

And that's been my problem: I've been hitting so hard I've been forgetting to let up. I've always believed that illness was kind of life's way of forcing us to take notice of something we're neglecting -- ourselves. Reminders are valuable. The trouble is, our memories are short.

I'm not quite sure what it is I've learned this week. It's not entirely clear to me yet. But I feel as if something has changed. Some little bit of me has had an inkling of what it wants, needs, can do. I'm really not quite sure what, though. It's strange to know I feel different, but I'm not sure how or why. I just do.

Next Friday, I turn 33. I have one week left to achieve a couple goals of mine. Then I can say I did everything I wanted to when I was 32. It might be the first time in years I've actually accomplished my primary goals... And I don't mean professionally, working for the man, and shit like that. I mean things that are, deep down inside, important to who I am as a person. Things that ultimately will mean I believe in myself. Risk-type things.

And that's a pretty good start.

Y'know, I know that my mother died at 57, and if anyone should feel like the clock is ticking, it's probably me. But, the thing is, she might've died young, but she died on her terms, after finally starting to live her life her way. It wasn't until she was 47 that her life really began. She got her realtor's license, learned to sail, captained a yacht in the Mediterranean, climbed mountains in China, fell in love with an adventuring guy and had the love affair of her life, and really, really became the woman she always wanted to be.

I'm lucky that I learned young that life's not over until you want it to be. You can always have new experiences, you can always become the person of your dreams. The clock's only ticking 'cos you've let it. Every now and then, you have to remind it who's calling the shots. Prioritize. Get rid of the stupid obligations. Do what's necessary. And always, always have time for you, because it's in those precious moments that life really lives.

I may have to go to work today, but I suspect it'll continue in this pleasant way. Today I feel like a contributor. A good morning to end a long week.

Encore Steff: Jazz Up the Sex Life with a Four-Letter Word: TALK

Ah, I'm too tired to write again. Damned sickness. Soon.

In the meanwhile, this is one of my older posts and one I think missed a lot of people's radars since it was right at Christmastime last year. I think it's a good one to repost, and hope you agree.

* * *

Still not convinced that better communication will up the sexual ante? All right, then read on.

Imagine you get a job. You're excited about it. It's dynamic, exciting. Oh, the possibilities, you think. So, you show up, wing it, and you think, "Hey, it's okay, after I've been here and they've seen what my stuff is, they're gonna wanna invest in me. They'll want to really school me and get me groomed for something better. I'm a contributor. Yeah, they'll tell me what they really want, when they're ready to."

And the management's over there, across the way. "Wow, you know, he may have something to offer. Hmm. We could use someone like that around here. I know what we'll do. We'll wait. When he's ready to know more, he'll come to us. Then we'll really know he'll be able to deliver. We'll let him... acclimatize, for now. I mean, hey, he's doing just fine for now."

Trouble is, "for now" doesn't have a shelf life. Do you know when "for now" expires? I sure don't. And "just fine," well, it never really makes the cut, does it?

The employee in this scenario? Fucked. Rightly. Right fucked. Proper fucked, even. Why? Pretty simple. Without clear direction, without a clear understanding of how he should perform his duties, he will never have the confidence to take risks that might better his performance, he'll never really know where he stands, and he'll never put his all into it. Worse yet, he won't know how to do his job better, nor what management desires him to do.

If you have a relationship where you're not telling each other how to satisfy you, you're going to be like the players above. As a receiver, you'll be the management -- getting loyal, dedicated service that suggests potential and even possibly alludes to brilliance, but always somehow slightly misses the mark, or even worse yet, is highly inconsistent because the areas of excellence go unspoken.

As the giver, you're just a lowly employee, and you'll never really know what your strengths or weaknesses are, nor what areas the management perceives most essential to get done. You might just never really know what you should deliver, and maybe, just maybe, you won't ever really fill the order, if you know what I'm saying.

So, if you manage to get things sorted and discussed, here's what I propose: Bi-weekly run-downs. Or however often you might enjoy a performance review. Have a conversation over dinner -- a private dinner -- and discuss the things you've enjoyed, the things you're feeling more of a craving for these days.

Sex is so much like food it's crazy. We all have cravings, and many of us go through a two-week period where we're eating Chinese every couple days. Well, maybe sex doggy-style's fitting the bill this week. It'd be nice to share that, wouldn't it? "Hi, dear. I want you to ride me like it's the Kentucky Derby finale."

We foolishly seem to talk about fantasies only in absolutes. I'd frickin' love a Mercedes conververtible from the late '60s, y'know, but this week I've been feeling a little more like taking the bus since the weather's so dodgy and the traffic so frantic. We go through flavour stages, and it's there in our sex lives, too, but often in such small, almost inconsequential ways that we often sooner ignore it than address it.

This conversation doesn't need to be clinical. In fact, I say nay to that notion altogether. I say make it dirty, irreverent, sexy, fun, coy, suggestive, romantic, passionate, perfunctory -- whatever gets your rocks off. I say do it over a decadent meal you cook together, and then eat it together in various states of undress with a fine bottle of red wine. (May I suggest throwing some really suggestive footsy into the under-table games? Footsy may not be the most sexually satisfying act, but Jesus, it's erotic, isn't it? Mm!) Or skip the food and sit naked on the couch, sipping wine, as you perform demonstrations on each other's body of what it is you're discussing / wanting.

You get the idea. Play with it. Play is fun. Play doctor like you did in the bushes as a kid. Hmm. I wonder how Tyler's doing these days, anyhow. Been a while. Ah, nostalgia.

So, here's your relationship homework: Periodical sex reviews. No negatives -- only constructive criticism, but really, really try to focus on positives, and try to go with the moment. And never, ever shy away from demonstration... or narration. And if you narrate, be suggestive and coy -- this can really add a little of the sizzle bang-bang I'm always talking about. It's one of those things that sounds ludicrous if you think about it, but in the heat of the moment, narration's a fun thing to toy with.

[Ed. Note: It's official. I need to get laid. Geez.]

Stumbling through Sickness

I'm just popping in, since my rather fun yet caustic rant of a couple days ago still sits front and centre. (Those of you who take my "rage" seriously need to lighten up. Rants rock. Love'em.) I'm a sickie Steff, but we've all known I've never been quite right in the head. Hardly a shocker there.

In the 82 hours since Sunday at 11, I've slept nearly 50 hours. You know what pisses me off most about sickness? What a waste of time it is. But that's all right. I'm constantly saying how everyone needs time to themselves, and I guess this is my downtime. Whatever. It just irks me to sleep so much, have lame dreams, and still feel tired. Blah!

I'm valiantly heading into the office today. (Boo! Hiss!) But it's the first time this week I've had the remote semblance of energy. (Yay! Huzzuh!)

Anyhow: On the horizon sits some time to write, probably tonight or tomorrow night, but we'll see. I may no promises.

What I want to write about, though, is this article. So, have a little read. My tentative working title? "In Praise of Fat." A-yup. Draw your own conclusions, but I reserve the right to surprise you. As always.

Have a day, people.

(PS: Starting this morning, a slow shift is occuring: I'll be moving all my best of archives to my new blog. Over the coming couple of months I hope to move most of the content here to a new home... Blogging will still happen. The same feel will still exist on the new blog, but I hope to have slightly higher standards for posting. So, a little less, but better when it happens. Hey, everyone's got a dream, man. I'll give you a heads up when I feel the new site's ready to go. For a while, things will be posted on both blogs. Then, one day, I'll simply make the switch. Stay tuned. Thank you, DH & JMb, for your assistance re: said blog!)

Go Away, World. Ain't No Welcome Mat No More.

AGH! I'm sick! Motherfucking bug-ass virus thing has bit me but good. Like I have any time at all for this shit? What's the most valuable part of your body when it comes to podcasting? Ding! Your head! You're absolutely right! Your prize is the all-new Sweet Fuck All! Now comes in cherry flavour!

I sound like I was bred by frogs.

And raised by smokers.

Yeah. You heard me. I's sexy. So sexy. [Croak.] I'm cursed. There will never be a podcast. Ever.

At least I have my sense of humour, and opposable thumbs. That's not too shabby. I can make shadow puppets. And laugh. There. All one needs for a decent life.

Head colds suck. Soon it will move into my chest. Then, bronchitis. Then, laryngitis. Let's hope we skip steps two to four. I could do without that shit.

Motherfucking bug-ass virus. Why, if I wasn't sick, I'd kick yo ass back to whatever fucked-up science lab of a human emitted you. Fuckety-fuck fuck.

Snicker. My rage is just so hilarious because I'm the one inside this body who knows, without a fucking doubt, that there is zero energy in my stores. I ain't goin' after nuffin' or noone for a spell yet. It's gonna be a wait.

So, it's 6:51. I'm going to bed. Possibly to sleep all night. I'm hoping I wake up for an hour or so, but that's about it. Fuckety-fuck fuck. Mmf. I don't want to miss the best part of fall, you know? This better be a couple days at best, man.

Sleep. Sleep, perchance to recoup. Vive la Steff?

Just Popping By

What up, my good people.

I'm just having a few days to myself and taking the pressure off of myself regarding posting. I said things might slow down around here for a bit and that looks to be happening. Mostly, I don't want to bother posting unless I have something I really want to say, as opposed to just generally slapping some words onto a posting, like I sometimes do. Like I'm doing now.

I've been spending my weekend caught in a weird headspace, and it's, um, well, weird. I haven't wanted to write about it, and still don't.

I just wanted to check in. To tell the truth, I think I'm getting sick. Gah. We're having a massive shift in weather, and I'm all sniffly. I hate sickness, both in me and in others. Grr.

I will say this: If you like intelligent television, watch Studio 60 tonight. I watched the pilot last night on Canuck TV and loved it. (Either 9 or 10pm on NBC Mondays.)

It's Aaron Sorkin's new show, and if you took his other two series, Sportsnight and West Wing, and mixed it with a cross between Gary Shandling and SNL, you'd have Studio 60. Smart, quick-paced, and good dialogue. It's good, not great, but it's early in the game yet. It is, however, good to see Sorkin back. When the best writer in television isn't writing for it, there's something wrong, even if he does like his nosecandy a smidge. There is sense to the world order again. And Amanda Peet's looking sexy in a smart role for a chick. Sense, meet world order.

Did I mention I hate sickness? I better not be getting sick! I don't have time for this shit. Grr!

On Freedom and Fallacies

This is take two on this topic. I’m starting fresh a couple hours later, after a glass of wine and, um, two helpings of my homemade chicken pot pie. You only wish you could make pot pie like mine. In yo dreams, suckah.

It’s the second take because this topic is really important to me and I don’t want to fuck it up.

Thank god I have quality guidance like that of Fame. Yes, you heard me, the ‘80s arts school drama. It’s on, and I’m chilling. Defragging my mind, as I like to say. Fluff is exactly the right fit.

Funnily, a girl in the episode scoffs at the notion of writing her private thoughts and dreams in a diary. “If I wrote down my dreams,” she says, “I’d get arrested.”

Yeah. Funny dat. About that, take note of the week that was in the world of the wide web. Proper fucked, indeed.

A Montreal guy writes some shit in a forum then figures rifle + college = a good afternoon. Like the motherfucking coward he was, he went out and tried to kill a bunch of people. Realizing he couldn’t even do a massacre right, he deprived us of the fun of letting cops kill him. The coward took his life. Fucking better off dead, anyhow. But he wrote in forums. We shoulda seen it coming.

A dickhead in Seattle decides he’s going to act like a fucking 13-year-old and reposts another city’s craigslist ad by some dirty-minded femme, and gets a couple hundred responses or something, then figgers he’s got rights to publish that private correspondence in an attempt to expose those apparent sickos to the world. But they answered a public ad. They shoulda seen it coming.

A young mother in Florida writes her secret other self dark thoughts on a public blog, and then her child goes mysteriously missing, improbably snatched from their window. Young mother kills herself 16 days into the toddler’s absence. But she wrote dark shit on blogs, then her kid vanishes. We shoulda seen it coming.

A video diarist on the world wide web is exposed as a professional actress working off a script. The show is produced, directed, and written, yet has duped the majority of its viewers, primarily through YouTube.com, into believing the so-called lonelygirl15 was a teenaged girl looked in her bedroom and homeschooled by orthodox religious parents. Doh. She’s a fake. Like ohmigod. But she, like, really talked to us, man! You shoulda seen it coming.

It’s happening. It’s really fucking happening. You know what I’m talking about. For some godforsaken reason, it’s starting to occur to people that this, like, internet thing might just be a way of seeing what’s really going on in the noggins of little people everywhere.

And, um, uh-oh, but what’s going on in those little people's noggins everywhere is something that’s not very pretty. Some people, it would seem, are angry. Some of them even feel disenfranchised. And, look. They’re acting on this shit.

Yeah, well. When the odds are stacked, you ought not be surprised at the outcome. Probability and logic being what they are and all, yes?

I’m part of the generation that got schooled in Orwell’s classic 1984. We were raised to believe that someday, one day, the government would hear every word we would utter, and freedom would be a thing of the past.

I'll be honest, the digital age scares me. The ease with which people can access information about me is frightening. It should frighten you, too. Unfortunately, the time is coming nigh where voices on the web are not just an anonymous blur with little impact on the real world. Now, we’re not so anonymous, and now this world is more real than it is virtual.

There’s coming a time where what you say here is going to come home to haunt you. This is the age of insinuation, and anything you say can be manipulated and used against you. Decide now if you plan to live in fear of that, or if you have the balls to play the game my way, and own your ability to say what you think and how you feel.

In forums such as this, someone such as me might decide to write a little bloggie in which the entire contents of our deepest darkest other selves are posted up on virtual walls for the world at large to indulge in. In essence, it’s a voice. I have a voice, you have a voice, we all have voices. It’s idyllic. A virtual Utopia in which we’re all given voices and identities, something that ironically clashes with our seemingly democratic lives – lives spent living in societies that claim to be governed by the people of the people for the people.

Only they're not like any people I've ever known. And I don't feel like I belong. And I'm tired of feeling this small because I'm just an ordinary gal. I thought I'd take my voice and use it. I'm not alone. You're doing it too. And him, and her, and hey.

We all took our existences online, where we thought we’d have the right to say what we think whenever the fuck it pops into mind.

Unfortunately, when such vocal freedom is enjoyed by a world at large, some of those voices will be beyond dissent. They will be voices of rage and fury and vengeance. Or maybe they’ll be coolly quiet. And that’s a risk we take by allowing open dialogue. Every now and then, though, those voices will be warning signals. Intervention might occur, and it might segue to prevention.

Just because assholes and the disenfranchised like these can use the web to serve their fucted means doesn’t necessitate that the rest of us should have to watch our words.

Sadly, the voice of reason doesn’t seem to resonate these days. I fear that the talking heads of today might soon decide that there is such thing as too much free speech and they will indeed succeed in legislating the internet.

In which case now might be the time to, like the good hunter Elmer Fudd suggests, be vewwy, vewwy qwiet.

Only we’re not hunting rabbits.

Ann Richards?

I don't generally like to admit my ignorance in matters. After all, your ignorance of my ignorance is my bliss. But allow me to fess up.

A reader wrote me today to ask my thoughts on Ann Richards. Well, the name rang a bell but I couldn't remember who she was. George W.'s predecessor as governor of Texas. Right.

Honestly, I don't know enough to comment. What little I know, she was admirable. Any woman who competed in the male-dominated world pre-1986 is a pretty cool chick in my mind, and she's by proxy about as cool as it comes, in that case.

Found a great quote of hers, talking about Georgie's daddy. "Poor George, he can't help it...He was born with a silver foot in his mouth."

But, yeah, all I can say is that there are women who go down as feminist role models, and she's got a great place on that list, for sure.

Still intending to write about the blogosphere. Friday night's a write night. After 9, anyhow. Must have drinks. ( :) Whee! Friday!)

What Wicked Web We're Weaving

It's been a rough week or two in the CyberGalaxy. At one end of the connectivity cosmos, a fraud in the Emerald City, Jason Fortuny, who duped the Craigslist sex-starved masses into sending to him graphic and revealing personal emails that were then splayed accross the world wide web for mockery and exposing.

Then, at the seeming other end of the sticky web, Lonelygirl15, who similarly duped the masses, but this time into believing a series of well-developed and elaborate hoaxes revolving around her as the poor disenfranchised trapped little daughter of overly religious parents.

And tonight we've heard the news that an avid blogger mother has apparently committed suicide while her child has been snatched from his crib. Missing, dead, who knows. Her blog reveals disturbing and dark imagery in her writing.

All in all, it's been a rough few days for the blogworld. There are repercussions out there in the real world for what we do in this one. It sometimes seems a rude awakening to some bloggers, but it is what it is. I've had my last employer sending me emails about postings I've been doing. We discussed my perception of their firm. It's been interesting getting that delayed reaction.

I plan to tackle these above topics in a single post over the next few days, but just to lay the groundwork, there's the outline up there. If you have any opinions about the strangeness of these three varied examples of cybersecrets go boom, please do share.

THE MOTHER WHO HAS COMMITTED SUICIDE as a result of her toddler being snatched (but some suspect she had a hand in it, given the nature of her blogging) is this woman.

Sorry, people. Been working hard and haven't had a chance to update.

Oddity of the Day

I may get around to writing late tonight, but that's not as likely as I'd sort of like it to be. I think I'm sorta taking a mental week off, in a way, in an attempt to recharge. There IS something I have to weigh in on, a story notion fed to me earlier in the week by x-Guy, but it's a time-v-life issue. It'll be a big, big story when I post it between now and Saturday, tho. I'm looking to be a little controversial with it, and something else happened today that ties in, so hence the post-poning thingiething.

MEANWHILE: Ever noticed how the Joy of Cooking has "how to skin a beaver" in it? Something tells me they ain't talking about Canadian girls, but whatever.

ANOTHER MEANWHILE: While checking out at a store last weekend with GayBoy, both of us were having a hard time keeping comments to ourselves when being served by this guy with the most chapped lips I've ever, ever seen. For the love of god, people, three words: Blistex Lip Conditioner. It's the best stuff ever.

Nothing's less sexy than lips that don't beg to be kissed. Soft, pouty, sexy lips that deserve nibbling and sucking and toying with for hours on end.

Chapped lips don't make the grade. EVER. Some people, like this guy, probably can't do much about it, but even if they're chapped or dry or whatever, a little Blistex gives a little shine, and that at least improves the appearance. Besides, it tastes nummy-yummy-ish. Or maybe I've just acquired the taste. Whatevah.

Now, the aforementioned and much-loved GayBoy is coming over to be fed. Not if I don't get cookin'!

Sugasm and Stupidity -- Together at Last

I have no brain cells. None. The alien mind probe clearly did its job.

I'm tired, frazzled, want to sleep more than I can afford to, and really want to eat more blueberry jam on some baguette. But I won't. No, I will not. But it's blueberry!

Anyhow. Seeing as I clearly have nothing of any value to share with you, I thought I would do two things.

One, finally get off my ass and post the Sugasm. Here you go: People with things they said on purpose. Not just mindless meaningless drivel of little consequence like this (but it's blueberry!), but actual thoughts. In, perhaps --dare I say it?-- logical order! Without ado, the Sugasm.

(Oh, and two, well, you'll have to scroll to the bottom of the post, then, won't you? It's down there. I promise!)

The best of the sex blogs this week by the bloggers who blog them.

This Week’s Picks
Body Image & Sex Work (http://lipstickexplosion.com)
“Then, I thought about myself in that playspace, obsessing over how to present my body, while the client, evidently, was enthralled.”

The Fever is Real (http://theholidaylife.blogspot.com)
“This was Dior’s way to lay down the gauntlet for Matthew… ‘I’m ready. I’m hot. I’m panting with desire. I’m gorgeous and sexy - come fuck me.’”

Just What You’re Missing (http://sabrinainstockings.com)
“That’s when I lean forward and kiss along your jawline… slow hungry pressings of soft lips and hot breath with just the barest hint of tongue.”

Mr. Sugasm Himself
Book Review: ‘Fresh: Girls of Seduction’ by Dave Naz (http://sugarbank.com)
Editors’ Choice
Having Myself All to Myself (http://www.TaraTainton.com)
Thoughts on Sex and Relationships
Second Week Without a Functional Computer Of My Own…..
Where are the manners? (http://cuntinglinguist.blogspot.com)
Would you sleep with a virgin? (http://edinerotica.blogspot.com) (http://totalsensuality.blogspot.com)
Sex Work
Panty Tree (http://radicalvixen.com/blog)
Sex News and Sexy Reviews
Clone A Willy Moulding Vibrator Kit (http://www.orgasmarmy.com)
The Man With Two Penises (http://www.quirkysex.com/blog)
Sex Toy Designer Spotlight: Lelo Interview (http://sultry.naughtyblog.net)
The Three Best Girl-on-Girl Pornos of All Time (http://blog.johnqafterhours.com)
Erotic Writing and Experiences
Back in His Arms (http://designingintimacy.blogspot.com)
Fare Amore (http://confessions112.blogspot.com)
Grrl’s Night Out (http://xantasia.blogspot.com)
Guest blogger: “Dessert” (http://emergingontheotherside.blogspot.com)
How we spent our Anniversary! (http://dontwakethekids.blogspot.com)
Just for the taste of her…(part one) (http://dirtydetails.blogspot.com)
The long hard weekend f*ck (http://dirtyandthirty.blogspot.com)
More Hot Wife Memories (http://marriedtoahotwife.blogspot.com/)
Need (http://www.kingdomofmean.com/sheets/)
Shower in the shower (http://solostories.blogspot.com)
NSFW Pics
Blonde Bombshell Jurgita Valts (http://www.thesexbox.com/blog)
Cowgirl HNT (http://texasspitfire.blogspot.com)
Gauge (http://www.internetisforporn.com)
Half-Nekkid in the Bible Belt (http://www.TarasNaughtyShop.com)
Happy naughty panties HNT! (http://darkside-journey.blogspot.com)
Sexy upskirt in kitchen (http://upskirtr.blogspot.com)
BDSM and Fetish
Back School, Back To Books, Back to “SchoolGirls’” Dirty Looks
Dishonourable discharge (http://assistantmistress.blogspot.com)
Fiction: Grocery Dom (http://erotiterrorist.blogspot.com)
How to make her body betray her… (http://everythingoze.blogspot.com)
On Shade45 With DJ Whoo Kid and Crew (http://www.caramelvixen.com/vixen-blog)
Playing hookie (http://redvelvetropeburn.com)
Sassy me (and domesticity) (http://aliferestarted.blogspot.com)
Spanking and Brass Bands (http://www.spankingwriters.com)
Tales From Under The Desk, Part 11 (http://thebinside.blogspot.com) (http://shayssexcolumn.blogspot.com)

(And if you'll notice, the bottom of the sign reads: "Spongebob Squarepants Fan Club meets in Tyrone's Mom's Basement every Wednesday, 7:30pm.")

Storybook Time with Smutty Steff!

Taken from my parents' 1969 (the summer of love, don'tcha know?) edition of Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Sex*

With this on the shelves, in the living room, for my entire childhood, is it any wonder this didn't have some sort of impact on me, as if by osmosis or something? Yeesh.

Should children be kept from masturbation? Is masturbation harmful?

The only thing harmful about masturbation is the guilt that is drummed into children who admit masturbating, by parents who may themselves masturbate but don't admit it. Every human being, at one time or another, in one way or another, has masturbated. Most of them feel overwhelmingly guilty because of it. Most of them have continued masturbating.

Some of the terrible things masturbation is supposed to cause are pimples on the face, loss of manhood, pollution, and weakness. Of these afflictions, only pimples are a recognized disease. All children at the time of puberty develop pimples. Virtually all children are actively masturbating at the time. It would then be more accurate to conclude that pimples cause masturbation. No minister, moralist, teacher, or scientific researcher has ever showen any evidence masturbation is harmful in any way.

Comes from the Latin masturbari, to pollute oneself.

Oh, yeah, and: Halle-fucking-lujah!
Steff endorses masturbation.
Take two and don't call me.

*(But Were Afraid to Ask)

Management Requests Your Patience

Hey, folks. Bear with me. I'm finally recording the first podcast -- but have to rerecord 90% of my work thanks to corrupted files. But there's movement! There's progress! I had hoped to have it ready for this Thursday but there will be a delay now. One thing after another, man. But that's okay. I'm copin'. But it also means I don't have as much time to write, so this blog will suffer this week, I'm sure. Stay tuned anyhow.

Speaking of podcasting...

Is there anyone out there willing to guide me through the process of how to stream my feed on my new site when I'm ready to go? I'll give you my MSN account and we can tackle it sometime over the next week...? All you would get is my undying love and affection, and maybe an amusing sticker as a thank-you, me being lowly underpaid writer girl and all. I'm looking forwards to getting this up and running, and now it's down to the crunch. Sometime soon, for sure.

In Praise of Fall

It's almost autumn. This is beginning to please me. I want to go hiking in fall colours and do some photography.

This summer plum tuckered me out. I never really did get to enjoy it, so I say bring on the fall. I'm suddenly getting two-day weekends, and they seem so much longer than they used to, now that I've been deprived.

I'm also beginning to enjoy my company more. On the down side, I've been having podcasting difficulties, but I think I've sorted it all out now. It's not going too badly!

I had some generous help from the x-guy today, which has resulted in a couple funny snippets for the podcast, and I think GayBoy's seeking an audio track out for me; something ludicrously cliche, and a totally gen-x opener for my podcast. It's a movie clip. I could give you a couple hints and anyone over 25 and under 45 would probably get it. I guess that's 26-44. Fine, then.

It's cool, it's retro, it's obnoxious. Hey, it's me. Fuck, yeah.

* * *

I had a semi-big epiphany (but then epiphanies are kinda like big by nature, yeah? well) in the last month or so. I really, really hate becoming single.

It's hard. Whether you're the dumper or the dumpee, there's a loss in the death of a relationship. If you have a heart, there is.

When I found myself having to become single again, it was a rude awakening. Somehow I stopped being myself in my relationship. I did the ultimate chick thing. I forgot about self. Suddenly, I was kinda like a ship without a rudder. Kinda figured I should be going somewhere, but had no idea how to make it happen.

Slowly, I began doing things solo and enjoying myself. Yes, that includes masturbation. But, yeah. It was sorta a rediscovery of self. Quite cool, honestly. This is called being single. Being single, when you're really truly there, is really fucking cool. It rocks. (And there's no fussing over who sleeps on wet spots. Wicked.)

And I'm not totally there yet, but I'm starting to get in touch with myself again. I'm probably 50% there. Lotsa work left, but there's a light now. Is good. Me likey. Oof.

* * *

When I was in college, in my journalism lab, we had a sign on the wall that read:

"The management regrets to inform you that,
due to financial restraints,
the light at the end of the tunnel
will be turned off
until further notice."

So, Here We Are Again

The whole 9/11 thing is feeling weird. Reminds me of when five years had passed since my mother's death. Has it really been so long? Boy, was that all it was? Five years?

Grief gets weird when you live with it for a long time and then -- poof -- it just vanishes, like. Guilt can come on, then. "I should be more depressed. Shouldn't I?"

I'm watching some of the retrospective stuff. I think it's important to remember it all, but I just don't want to face any marathons. I forget sometimes, though, how fucked up it must have been to live in NY in those early days.

I've been thinking about that day. The weather today was very similar to the weather then -- clear, sunny, warm, with just a hint of fall on the light wind. I remember the silence that morning. I never found out until I got to work -- I never saw the news or anything that morning. I was enjoying coffee, sitting barefoot in my deck captain's chairs, curling my toes around the metal railing.

I remember walking into the office, my closed captioning office, and the radio was turned on for the first time (and last time) ever. All the employees had no headphones on and were numbly editing files that probably needed no more editing. I knew something huge had happened.

"What?" I asked.

"Someone's flown planes into the two World Trade Centre towers. Thousands of people are dead. They think it was terrorists. And someone hit the Pentagon, too."

And like that I knew life on the continent had changed. No longer were we untouchable. Quite the opposite.

I didn't think I could lose any more innocence after that day, but I was evidently wrong. I grow more jaded and disenfranchised with every passing year.

For a time, 9/11 made us all better people. We found the commonality. We had community. We had a cause. And something happened. A chasm. Conflict. Chaos.

Strange how quick that tide turned. Sad, too. Sigh.

When Will It Change?

I work a couple blocks away from one of the nastiest parts of my beloved city, Vancouver, Canada. It's like a whole other world when you stumble into the Downtown Eastside, just two blocks east of my office, a place that held, in the early '90s, the highest urban rate of AIDS and HIV infection on the globe.

People like me who've lived in this city our whole lives know more about the disenfranchised in that area, and I have my own speculations on how it's gotten so out of hand, but I've never looked into it all that much.

Suffice to say that at that two-block point east of here, it's like an invisible wall has gone up. People sleep on streets, heroin is shot in alleys, fights break out over drugs, and everything's out of control.

This area houses most of the prostitution and all of the meth and heroin junkies in the city. The mentally ill who are deinstitutionalized run rampant in this hood, and I'm faced daily with heartbreak and hopelessness when I see how much work is left to be done to help all these impoverished, seemingly forgotten members of our city.

We're beginning to get a reputation internationally for what's largely gone unchecked in this city, and that saddens me, considering all else this city has to offer -- the natural beauty, the unforgettable cuisine, the multicultural population, the sports, and more. What the world doesn't see and doesn't seem to understand is how stacked against success the odds really are in dealing with this travesty.

This city is a magnet for the nation's homeless -- even for America's homeless. They all want to be here because the climate is so tolerable year-round and because the cops tend to empathize rather than penalize these impoverished people. After all, if you're homeless, where would you rather be in the winter, the snows of Toronto and Montreal, where it can go far below freezing every winter, or in the temperate climes of Vancouver?

Add to that the fact that so many drugs land here in Vancouver, where an average of 150 million massive cargo freights pass through annually, where we barely have the staff to search them, and where drug laws are so much more relaxed than in America, and you have a ticking time bomb that no easy solutions will patch.

The world's about to hear more regarding this harrowing part of Vancouver, though, with the release of a controversial new "fictional" horror film by Australian filmmakers that focuses on one of the most legendary bastards ever to live in this province. Robert "Willie" Pickton is facing trial for the brutal murders of 26 Vancouver-area prostitutes, but is suspected of killing more than 125 of these women over the course of 20 years. A pig farmer by trade, Pickton covered his ass well by having his pigs devour the corpses of these women. As a result, little DNA evidence was recovered by what was the largest criminal investigation in Canadian history.

I'm saddened by the news that the families of these missing and dead women will have to endure a film that will probably sensationalize these brutal murders. And while I'm further saddened by the continuing downward spiral of this incredible city's reputation, perhaps international attention will finally convince both the British Columbian and Canadian governments that this absolutely is NOT a problem that can be solved by Vancouver's government alone. Our cops are stretched as thin as cellophane and there's no money to be had.

In less than four years, the world will be on our doorsteps when the 2010 Olympics unveil. And what will have happened to the disenfranchised and forgotten by then? God only knows, but many, including myself, suspect they'll be shifted out of the downtown core, pushed off to the side just to become some other neighbourhood's problem. Out of sight, out of mind, and, possibly, out of hope.

Why I Think I'm a Feminist

Because I never thought they meant it when they said “no.”*
Because I don’t define myself according to the men in my life.
Because I think I can do anything I want to do.**
Because I got back on my bike after I was thrown off.
Because I’m tougher than the day is long.
Because my mom raised me right.
Because I’ve never thought being a woman was holding me back.
Because, despite periods, being a chick rocks.
Because it’s better than the other option.
Because I gotta be.
Because it’s cool.
Because I am too.
Because.

(*Um, the comments explain this one!
**With the right work ethic, of course.)

In A Jam, And I Need Help

My deadline on my podcast delivery is a week a way and I've got talker's block. As my readers, can you give me opinions on which of my writings here (or on the other blog even) you most want to hear me talk about and expand? Please, none of the sex-tip/how-to's. I'm not comfortable going there on air yet. Anything else is fair game. I've been trying to do all-new content, but it's killing me, so I'm gonna head for my safety zone. What postings most interest you, and why do you want to hear it? Post comments sooner than later, please, 'cos I gotta get cracking tonight. THANKS.

Fine, Let's Bang That Drum Again: Change

So, earlier I asked if you have the right to ask a risk-taker to tone down their lifestyle once you get hooked to them.

My opinion? No. You do not. And if they tell you you can go ahead and tell them how to change; don't. You'd fucking with what oughtn't be fucked.

In a nutshell.

My posting was inspired by the death of Steve Irwin. There are those who apprently think he should've "settled down" since he had kids. Yeah, as a kid, the first thing I wanna know is that my father gave up almost everything he loved so he could raise me -- sit in a fucking armchair with a remote and tell me how he "used to be like that" once.

Terri Irwin got a precious gift that most of us might never, ever, ever receive: She fell in love with someone who kept all the qualities that made him so loveable as the person he was when they first met. Bloody sweet, that. And she had it for a while. And then it got snatched. Love happens, death happens, it all is what it is.

Life's a truckload of hurts some days and there's no getting around that.

The point is, it's hard enough to be ourselves in the face of everyday life. It's harder still to remember who we are when we get lost in the arms of someone else. To be able to hang on to your identity despite your love for someone else and your wish to be with them, why, that's as downright admirable as it gets.

To hell with those who think otherwise.

_________________

In other Croc-Hunter news, let me go on record to say that, while Germaine Greer periodically says something intelligent, I:

a) think she can be a complete twat who has done as much to hinder feminism as she has to further it. She's arrogant, dismissive of men, flighty, inconsistent, hypocritical, and far too militant for my tastes. (Despite my believing I'm a feminist, thank you very much. Ain't no fucking eunuch here, baby.)

b) think she's a far bigger bitch than I'd thought before now that I've read her comments on the death of Steve Irwin.

I do not believe that to be a strong woman I need to demoralize men. I believe that, as a strong, independent chick, I can exalt men in my life and cater to them as I wish, because I fucking well know who I am when I go to bed at night (most of the time; we all get a little too lost in our relationships some of the time). I take no backseat to any man. But I'll hold the door open for 'em if they'll let me, because I have nothing to prove. I'm empowered by the mere fact that I don't need to seek power, all right?

I'd get into my whole beef about how feminism has been executed, but I'm too tired and it'd take too damned long. Suffice to say that while I fight for my equality, I don't think it needs to come at the cost of emasculating men. There's room enough for us both, and I don't think chicks like Greer understand that concept, but then I don't like her enough to read her work. I listen to others gripe about her and praise her, so I'm ignorant, but by choice.

A Debate! We Loves a Debate!

Okay, a moral debate for you.

I made the off-hand comment on my other blog that I was surprised to be taken so aback by the Crocodile Hunter's (Steve Irwin) death. I said, "well, it computes. Play with dangerous animals, die at their hands."

A reader then commented, "All I can say is I hope he has a large insurance policy for his wife and child. There's a point where self has to take a back seat to the others in your life."

And I guess it just had me thinking. How true is that statement? How much can we expect a lover to yield to us after the pact between us has been made to share our lives? If you're someone like Terri Irwin, and you fall for this wacky, crazy guy who does more with dangerous animals in any given day than the average person can expect in a lifetime, are you right in expecting them to dial back the nature of who they are in the interest of ensuring longevity in your relationship? Is the relationship even worth it, if it means removing the element of danger from their life changes them into a different kind of person?

And don't try to confuse the question by factoring into the argument his two children. The trouble with children is, they take everything hard. The trouble with life is, it's hard. The trouble with parents is, they don't ever want their children to learn this inrguable fact.

So, what do you think? When you get involved with someone who's a risk-taker, is that risk-taking an intrinsic part of who they are, and you, as their lover and with a vested interest in keeping them alive, do you have any right in asking them to change their ways solely for your benefit?

_______________________

In other news: I still need MP3 files of your fun-filled orgasms, people. I've received a couple VERY porn-type ones that, frankly, I'm not interested in. Let's just have normal gasps and shudders of ecstasy, can we? The first one goes to air in the next two weeks, so I need these files coming in lickety-split, peeps!

Also, coming soon is a contest I'll be having where your most embarrassing sex moment could land you a free copy of one of the best sex-advice books in the biz. All yous needs to knows.

On Why the Saga of J is Doomed to Remain Incomplete

One of the first things I ever began writing on this blog was The Saga of J. (Part one, part two, and part the third.)Not a month goes by that someone doesn't email me or ask me to finish the fucking thing. I've kept thinking, "Oh, maybe I'll get around to it," but you know what? I won't. I simply will not. Now it's a choice, not an inevitability. Ain't gonna happen, boys and girls.

When I was writing the story last summer, I was in a course that had me fired up and remembering the Gloried Days of Old. I began to realize I was living in the past with some idealized memory of something that wasn't necessarily all I was touting it to be.

The thing with memories is that they're always stronger than they probably ought to be, and the thing with the present is it's always less appreciated than it ought to be. At the time, when I hooked up with J, it was pretty intense. What I didn't know then was, he was lying. He wasn't single. He was going out with a friend of mine and having some relationship issues. He told me they'd been done for some time, and since I hadn't seen her, I believed him. But then things were complicated by the fact that he'd been casually pursuing me for two years by then.

"BUT WHAT HAPPENED, STEFF?!" What you probably need to know is, within the next five minutes after the point where Saga of J Pt. 3 ends, an errant ice cube found its way between my legs and inside me just as J was leaning in for a kiss, me still bound and blindfolded, and I reacted with my whole body. I sprung up, my head rocketing forward, me all shocked and cold, and our mouths collided. I chipped a tooth, and he bloodied his lips where I cut him.

The sex pretty much ended then, since I'd been so jarred out of the moment with the errant ice cube. He untied me while we had a good laugh, then hung out examining my injuries in the bathroom before we playfully headed into the shower and lathered each other up. That was that.

We had a few more sexual encounters that week, both our parents being out of town, and by the end of it, well, it was the end. A lot of sex, a short period, a good friendship. We were never friends again. I've spoke to him once in probably the 12 - 13 years that have lapsed since then.

When I was writing parts 3 and the never-gonna-hit-daylight part 4, I had just ended a tawdry and short-lived relationship that really evoked a lot of what I'd had with J. This was a brief and intensely sexual affair I had last October. The sex was fucking incredible, and probably remains the best of my life. We both had had a hard year or so of being sexually denied and we took it out on each other time and time and time again, in very, very good ways.

That short-lived relationship ended rapidly after one particular orgasm when he was kneeled looking down at me on the floor with this blissed-out grin, and -- WHAM -- I could've sworn I was looking up at my brother. Spitting fucking image, man. It creeped me right out and I lost all attraction towards him. Then came another guy on the heels of him, someone I had an intellectual connection with but couldn't get passionate about, despite wanting to feel that way towards him. Suddenly, I was lost and confused in the realm of sex again. So, I wrote more about J, living out an old "safer" and "less complicated" part of my life.

But, suddenly, I felt it was unhealthy, and I really couldn't give a fuck if people all over the place want the end of the story.

And finally, another reason is, I just don't want to reveal exact particulars about my sex life to you people ever again. No offense. It just feels wrong. I don't mind alluding. I don't mind mentioning brief snippets, but to lay out a whole tale from start to finish just feels incredibly violating. It really does. I can't do it. I won't. Prices get paid and lessons get learned.

(No, I'm not swearing off writing about sex again. How I've been writing since December's right on target with what I'm comfortable with. The Saga crosses the line. Very much so. I have repeatedly considered deleting it, but on principle will not do so.)

Whatever you may think of me, there are aspects of myself I've probably never told anyone and probably never will. This is a challenging forum -- being open but not splayed is a hard balance to attain. Somewhere along the way, writing that story, a boundary became apparent that I no longer wanted to cross. And when it comes to boundaries, you get to decide which ones to respect. Well, I have chosen.

And now it doesn't help, either, that an old friend has crawled out of the woodwork who happened to be J's longtime ex-girlfriend (and not the one he cheated on to be with me, thank god) and who happens to have been reading me for some untold length of time now. It's strange to learn of that.

So, moral of the story? You know what you need to know, and no, that story is not being written for you, but aside from the few details I've shared, is kept locksafe inside now. I'm just not that kind of girl after all, it seems. There's only so much kissing and telling I'm willing to do. Who knew?

School's Back and Other Shit

All the boys and girls are back in school today. All the mommies and daddies are weeping with joy. All the university students are ready for dorm games and hijinks.

It's that time of year again.

My fond memories of college bring back copious recollections of sex in cars and the great outdoors. Ah, the good old days. Now living dangerously means fucking on the floor, carpet burn be damned. Well, when the delicious act of fucking avails itself to me again, that is. I really should get around to writing about all the reasons I love having sex out in the world. Not like I've done it in, oh, the last six or so years, but hey. I DID. A LOT. ONCE.

I say seize the moment, kids. Relish your college years and enjoy the sex that crops up everywhere, because it's a time in your life that you'll always look back on and miss, no matter how shitty it felt when you were in the midst of it.

And if you're in high school and reading me, well, shame on you. I have a sign that says you're supposed to be 18. I mean, shouldn't the Tooth Fairy and Santa be explaining sex to you? Since that's as much of a reality as your parents explaining it, right? Whatever. Just don't have sex 'cos you have NOTHING BETTER to do. Sex is too full of mindfucks and headtrips to use as a replacement for Spongebob Squarepants and Britney Spears, all right? Okay. Now party on.

Where are the manners?

Every now and then an email comes in that's the exact right email for what's going on in my life. That happened Friday. I'd had an incident earlier in the day that had me seething with rage, and his email hit right home. So, first, the email, then I'll tell you what happened, and then you'll get my two cents. Sounds like a plan, no?

I was wondering if there was a certain age where teenagers or
adults realise that manners are important and can learn to appreciate them?
Because I've been trying my whole life (I'm still a teenager, but still) to
be a gentleman (opening doors for others, asking if the elderly need help,
speaking politely, etc.) and to be helpful as much as possible, but it seems
that it is not appreciated at all. So far throughout a few years of high
school, I've tried to help others boost their marks with assistance on their
homework, but they can't seem to understand that others have morals and
won't cheat for them. (again, turning into a rant i suppose..)

I guess I'm really just sending this email to ask another's
opinion about manners and whether or not it is truly appreciated in today's
society. I've asked a few teenage girl friends and they say that it is good
to have manners and it's something important they look for, yet I see them
going out with lowlife guys who are despicable and need to learn manners.
Is this just a teenage thing to do that you overcome later on and realise
it's importance and learn to be grateful for it? Or is it completely
dependant on the people's standards they've set.

Now, what happened to me the other day was when I was riding over to my brother's place. He and I live in absolute opposite ends of the city -- he in the most northeastern section, I in the most northwestern section. I work smack dab in the middle, downtown, and between there and my brother's is 30-square blocks of what's essentially some of the poorest and most underprivileged in Canada. If you know where to avoid, you can go without ever seeing any of these people.

I don't try to avoid it, I just go through. I always see really tragic things when I do and it keeps me appreciating the little I have. This time, though, I was stopped at a light and this old guy, about 70, was in a wheelchair, completely unable to use his hands, and could only pull himself forward using the toes on his right foot. He was literally moving about 2 feet a minute. Naturally, the light turned red with him in the middle of the street, and I got a solid green light to go. Meanwhile, he's stopped, looks like he's about to cry from exhaustion, just can't go any further, and all these fucking people are walking past, ignoring him.

I was in a RAGE. I pulled my scooter over, got off, cursed, "You people ought to fucking help! Where the hell are manners gone?" Then I leaned over to the man and said, "May I push you across the street, sir?" And he went soft with relief. He just sighed, "Please?"

I had a bit of an argument with a couple punks on the corner after that, who seemed to think I was flaming them, and yeah, you know, I was. Just fucking standing there, doing nothing.

When I got over to my brother's place, I saw my nephew standing there, and I sat him down. I said, "If you ever see a little old lady or a little old man who can't get across the street or they're taking too long, you HELP them. You hear me?" I made sure he knew the distinction between "stranger danger" and helping a senior citizen who really does need the help. After all, that's how I was taught.

In MY world, I was raised to help people. I was raised to give a hand and do the right thing. I was taught to say please and thank you, and I was told to hold doors open for others.

And I KNOW life moves fast, and I KNOW people are more rushed than they used to be. You know what? I don't give a fuck. *I* find the time to still be polite. I find the time to thank people and make pleasant small talk. Why the hell don't they?

So, kid, I say keep going. The thing about being a polite person and not behaving politely just because you're not getting it in return is that you start to get bitter about it. It changes you. Cynicism finds you and apathy makes a home in you. Stay true to the person you are. Help others, be polite. You'll one day be surrounded by a better class of people, by people who appreciate that in who you are. It will be a deciding factor on the kinds of engagements you're invited to and the kinds of experiences you have. You're still a kid, you're in high school, and you're stuck in a social world you have little say in. In a few years, that all changes.

I know I will not date a man who has no manners. I will watch how he behaves and treats others, and I'll note whether he expresses gratitude for the little things I say and do for him, and if I don't like what I see, I will walk.

Life's too short to be with people who just don't understand basic human decency. I figure that eliminates about 60% of the world from eligibility for my bed, but whatever. I'm fine with having high standards. Are you?

They Really Are Telling the Truth!

I have finally found a lipstick that doesn't lie. Actually, it's more of a gloss, or possibly a science experiment. Outlast by Cover Girl comes with the colour at one end and the sealing clear gloss at the end. It promises 10 hours coverage. In the past, I've tried many of these so-called marathon lip colours, and I note the time of when it goes on, and I check the progress during the day.

WELL, Cover Girl Outlast went on at 8:30 am and had to be washed off at 11! Fabulous! And the colour never faded during the day. I'm sold. Now to buy one or two more for some colour range. Now, had I been kissing some cute guy, maybe it'd have worn off sooner, but I'm a bit of a lip-nibbler anyhow, so I think I've tested its range pretty well, and 15 hours is pretty astounding for colour-lasting time. Let's hear it for a product that does what it says it'll do: Woot!