Stuff Rachel Fucking Hates

Expensive postage. Today I mailed something to the next town over, and because it was in a big envelope, it cost more than it does to send a letter to Spain. What is that?

Overstaffing. I am the only person in America (besides Heather, who works in the same office I do) who has too many people working at her place of employment. I’m happy for all of us that we have jobs, but I am kind of pissed that I am consistently reduced to playing Minesweeper at work because there is literally nothing else to do.

Douchebag customers. Please refer to my last post.

Research projects. In all honesty, this investigating-same-sex-relationships-and-gender-roles-in-1700s-theater class is killing me.  I love talking about this stuff, but I hate doing self-directed research which then needs to translate into a highly detailed and organized final product. We are  talking about the girl who in the sixth grade made up the book for her book report. I am not cut out for this.

Winter. I try to have a good attitude about these things, but it has been months now and at this point my hands are starting to crack open. Like, literally. What is that?

Fred Phelps. His list of accomplishments includes anti-gay protesting at Matthew Shepard’s funeral, demonstrations at the burials of US soldiers, and the coining of the phrases “God Hates Fags” and, more puzzlingly, “God Hates Sweden.” Next week he and his buddies are coming to Cambridge to protest at a high school; as far as I can tell the only inciting incident is that… they have a GSA? I don’t even know. Luckily, with the Phelps-a-Thon, we are able to make this suck less. If you pledge just a few cents, every minute that he protests will raise more money for the local LGBT family resource center. Do it! I dare you!

Michel Foucault. Least favorite philosopher, almost definitely. (Although actually to be fair I am not so into Nietzche or Kant either.) Once he started telling me about how I don’t have a self, and we haven’t been on speaking terms since.

Stuff Heather Thinks is Super Great

The 81st Academy Awards. Go Heath! Go Kate! And way to pwn, Slumdog!

The word “octomom.” We may not agree with her decision to raise an entire troop of children on welfare and then snarl at her own mother all over TV, but one has to admit that Nadya Suleman earned herself a catchy title. If only she had eight tentacled arms…

Receiving letters after you’d given up on them. I got a postcard and two letters this week, forwarded to me from when I was in England, that were dated weeks ago. The oldest one was written November 18. And even though those letters were chock-full of stuff I already knew by now, it felt like my friends were right in the room.

The State singing instrumentals. The State is Rachel’s bf, one of my roommates, and a music major. So when he talks about music he heard in class, he has to act it out with his voice: “bloooop! bloooop! bapbapbapbap bap bap-ba!” (That is, he says, Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring.”)

Songs that start quietly and end with a rousing chorus of voices. Hey Jude, don’t make it bad. Take a slow song, and make it faster.

This video I found of a dancing bird. It’s stupid and normally I consider myself above the whole look-at-how-funny-my-pet-is, AFV-type videos, but I found this at one in the morning, and it’s kind of hysterical. This calls for a danceoff. Bird, it is on.

Kate Beaton. She does amazing comics of historical figures that reinforce the terribleness of mine.  Specifically, this one of Oscar Wilde and Bosie:

slacking off

and I know I haven’t posted much this week.  Sorry.  Here’s something I doodled this week!  Take it as compensation!

the backstory to your cappuccino

By day, I am a mild-mannered liberal arts student with messy hair and a penchant for cardigans. But at night, my thick-framed black eyeglasses betray me as a barista. I become aloof and pretentious instead of just socially inept, and capable of serving you a barely drinkable latte and then arching an eyebrow when you don’t tip. The cafe where I work serves snacks and ice cream along with the coffee, and hosts performances, concerts, and club events. Tonight my superfab coworker and I were working during a particularly unenjoyable performance, and fell back on the predecessor of the liveblog: the Notebook Log.  I will share. Blue is me, purple is Alissa.

11:03 What are all these fucking bros doing here? Bros we don’t know!

11:05 SOMEONE ASKED ME TO CARRY THEM A NAPKIN. FUCK ME. He looks like a hunchback

11:11 We are renaming this Samstravaganza (performer of excessively long standup)

11:13 Girl laughing really hard while dumping her grilled cheese in a chocolate shake … is embarrassing herself.

11:16 This guy has a douchey haircut: Y/N

11:18 AWFUL standup, probs freshman

11:22 It is not fair that Alissa gets to take cigarette breaks just because she actually smokes

11:28 Asshole has no new jokes. Freshman think its fonnny it’s NOT!

“This school is like being stuck in a small bathroom.”

11:28 Alissa spells “funny” with three n’s

11:38 Guy in black leather jacket is waiting for Rachel outside the door?!

11:53 update: I hate improv & jocks, but love the giant pokey stick we found

12:08 Okay, there were like two parts of this that were funny. But that was all.

12:18 Playing Closing Time over the sound system.

12:21 Lazy eye douchebag hid bowl and cup under couch

12:30 Should I just put this on fucking repeat? Why aren’t they leaving?

We did put Closing Time on repeat. Eventually everyone left. Also of note is that we found a kippah hidden inside one of the curtains, and have since pinned it to the wall behind the counter. I am in my pajamas at 1:22 am, retroactively liveblogging. Don’t let anyone tell you a college education isn’t worth it, kids.

why do they all have to be so damn fluffy?!

Okay, so I know that having a weakness for adorable things (baby humans, baby animals, etc.) is a female stereotype we have tried hard to overcome by becoming lawyers, getting our Master’s and/or using non-gendered substitutes for the word woman.  I get that.  If one likes cute things then one will look ditzy, and who wants that?  Not us independent women.  If someone were to win me a teddy bear at a carnival, say, I would probs shove it in my closet, only tossing it on the bedspread when s/he came to visit.

But I just discovered Cute Overload thirty minutes ago and it’s already become a problem for me.  Seriously.  An evildoer would just have to chuck at me a photo of a hedgehog in a cereal bowl, or a baby hamster eating potato chips the circumference of its body, and I would fold like a T-shirt.

all i don’t want for christmas

Inspired by an especially  ridiculous and ill-suited ad on Facebook this morning, I’d like to provide a handy tool to all those close to me and publish a non-wish list. In no particular order, here is a list of things never to get for me under any circumstances.

1. A teddy bear or other stuffed animal. What the fuck, facebook? I am a grown woman with two jobs and a tax refund coming my way. Isn’t it a little patronizing to assume I will be attracted to a child’s toy just because I have a uterus?
2. Housekeeping appliances. Speaking of having a uterus, giving me items to assist me in cleaning the house is incredibly insulting. Vacuums, swiffers, novel scum-erasing things you saw on infomercials – if I get any of that, I will assume it is your way of volunteering to use that item yourself and take on the cleaning tasks associated with it. Exceptions include cooking appliances, if they are things I actually want. Examples include an immersion blender, a Zojirushi rice cooker, or – God help me – a VitaMix blender.
3. Pads of paper, writing utensils, mousepads, coffee mugs, or anything else with my name on it. That shit is dumb. There may come a time when I am a woman of the world and need fancy stationery with my name in a professional but attractive seraphed font, but I think we can agree I will never need my initials at the top of my grocery list.
4. The complete works of Shakespeare. I already have them.
5. Dumb jewelry – and this turns out to be most jewelry. Think about this one. Have you ever seen me wear earrings that are shaped like tiny Dachshunds? How about an anklet with dolphins and rhinestones on it? No? Then don’t buy it.
6. Candles or body lotion. This one is doubly bad because they are both useless and expensive. For the money you spent on a candle the size of my head that smells like vanilla pomegranate lemonade with coconut shavings, you could have bought me like three servings of sushi.
7. Books by authors that sound “right up Rachel’s alley!” If I don’t already read them, it’s because they’re not very good. Also, an informational bulletin: If the cover art features a slick graphic design of high heels, lipstick, a purse, or a cartoon girl who would weigh less than 90 pounds if real, just put it back.
8. Cell phone accessories. Not even those cute loop things with tiny Japanese cartoons on the end of them.
9. Crappy-ass acrylic yarn that you found in your grandmother’s attic. If your grandma doesn’t want it, what makes you think I will?
10. Indian cookbooks. Not that these aren’t a conceptually appropriate gift; it’s more that I have too many. You are welcome to try at ethnicities that you don’t think I own – like, I got a Finnish cookbook a few years ago, and was excited and intrigued.

i have not seen slumdog millionaire

or any of the other movies up for anything in the Oscars this year. Also, I don’t care about the Oscars. So I spent last night trying to catch up on Restoration dramas by women playwrights before the year 1800, and was asleep by midnight. But! When I woke up today, I read Mason-Dixon’s liveblog coverage of the event anyways, because I think they are the two funniest ladies my mom’s age who are not my mom in the world. You don’t care about Mickey Rourke’s hairstyle? Me neither! Until I read about it there.

Speaking of liveblogging, I’d like to give you the latest update in our continuing coverage of How Rachel Feels About Her Haircut. Today, after taking a shower and subjecting it to Routine Styling: pretty okay.

Kate Winslet is too cool for me

It’s not even an hour after she won Best Actress, but someone on Wikipedia has already updated her article.  That is how you know you’re big, people.

(If anyone personally associated with Kate Winslet stumbles across this baby of a  blog, would s/he please tell her that she is good in practically everything and that Heather sends her a mental high five [slash would like to be friends]?  Thank you)

oh goodness i hope this meme is still cool

1. I keep my nails as short as possible at all times, and haven’t painted them since high school.
2. On a related note, I think long toenails are super gross.
3. In the eighth grade, when we were supposed to be practicing trust falls, I let Joe L.  hit the ground totally intentionally. Sorry, Joe!
4. I learned to knit from the septuagenerian grandmother of the director of the YMCA afterschool program I went to in elementary school.
5. I straightened my hair for most of middle school.
6. Once my brother and I were so scared by an episode of Scooby Doo that we ran crying to wake up our mom on a Saturday morning. I can’t remember for sure but I think it may also have been her birthday? Sorry, Mom.
7. I am really, genuinely into soy. Soymilk, tofu, soy crisps, edamame, all of it. Even fake meat, most of the time.
8. For most of my adolescence and well into college, I would braid my hair into two pigtails before I went to sleep.
9. I am totally okay with eating food off the floor, but hair in my food (or even having to think about hair while eating food) is unbearable for me. Once I found an incredibly long hair in Christmas dinner and couldn’t eat any of it. Worst Christmas ever.
10. In my bedroom at home is a three-foot-tall wooden statue of an Indian princess that my mom and I rescued from someone’s trash when I was like six.
11. I read The Hiding Place in the fifth grade, and The Catcher in the Rye when I was like twelve.
12. I don’t get Pavement.
13. I’ve never been in any jet ski accidents.
14. I really like public transportation. Like, I can drive, but I would prefer to take the T everywhere if I could.
15. I think probably the first concert I went to was the Indigo Girls, and I was like eleven, and with my mom. I feel like this explains a lot about me.
16. I don’t know what “ipso facto” means.
17. Wall-E legit made me cry.
18. This is the funniest joke I know:
What’s brown and sticky?
A stick.
19. I have never been to a funeral. I have maybe been to a wedding once, but I wasn’t invited and only stayed for 10 minutes and I don’t think I saw the vows exchanged.
20. I have seen maybe every Arnold Schwarzenegger movie ever. My favorites are Eraser and True Lies. Oh wait, also Terminator 2.
21. The cell phone I have right now is a model that was created solely to be marketed to senior citizens. I got it because it was cheapest, but also because I am genuinely excited to have a 911 emergency button.
22. This Christmas, my little brother gave me a liquor luge. I will never be cool enough to use it.
23. I would say I average 5-6 cups of tea a day.
24. I can’t watch scary movies ever. Not even bad ones. I saw The Reaping last year, and couldn’t sleep.
25. My best time on the Intermediate level of Minesweeper is 72 seconds.

Heather needs…

…a childhood.  Something more to be satisfied.  Men, right now.  A rest.  Two (not one) therapists.  Your financial support.  Help.  To grow up.  A job.  An eccentric beauty parlo(u)r owner acting as a spokeperson.  Some bodyguards.  To start wearing a brassiere.  A life.  A bigger cup to hide behind.  A vacation.  A family.  To be congratulated.  Gatorade.  £10,000 a day.  To talk about the weather.  A new shrink.  To jump on the bandwagon too.  Protection.  Prayers.  A drink.  A reality check.  To get on with her life.

Four of these things, for this particular Heather, are true.