Fear the Monster! 

Small Irritations

Have you ever noticed how certain people just irritate you? It's not as if they try.. but their very existence causes you to break out in hives? I hate it when that happens.

I also hate feeling the crushing anxiety I feel when someone at work starts sneaking around. How's this for direct: If you want to know what I am doing, ask me. I am honest to a fault and I have no problem with telling you what you want to know. Hell, I have ADD, so I have to write everything down. There is a log of what I do every day. Every fax, every email, every phone call. Otherwise I would forget what was said before the connection was even broken. And for god's sake don't try to creep up behind me to see what I am doing. All you are going to see is work.. well, that and a very irritated employee.

How to Sell an Engagement Ring

I have decided I am going to do it. Even though I feel that it is somehow wrong to sell the ring that symbolizes the failed marriage.. I paid for the thing anyway. It isn't as if he has any claim to it, to ask for it back. I need to pay off my car, and I think I can get enough money for this ring. Anyway, it's not like I will ever wear it again. You can't just wear a ring like that for no reason. And I don't think the boyfriend really wants to see me sporting my wedding ring from the last unlucky schmuck when we're out on a date.

So, here's the best way to do it. First, get the ring cleaned so it sparkles and shines like it did the day you bought it, and makes you hurt to even look at it. Then go have it appraised by a reputable jeweler. After you have the appraisal, you can list it on ebay or in the paper. If you're trying to get the most for your jewelry, though, don't go to a pawn shop. You'll get quick money for it there, but you won't get nearly as much.

And I don't think I could sell it to a pawn shop. But I am selling it, even if I want to cry at the last minute. It isn't doing me any good to hang on to it.

The World According to a Sophomore

As an employee of a University, I get the student newspaper every Friday, complete with horrid cartoons, advice columns, and unbridled (if uneducated) opinion. Today's edition begs to be blogged, even if it is only a student newspaper, and even if I am an adult who really shouldn't be able to care less.

But you see, there is a 2-page spread entitled "Most Overrated" where these o-so-cultured students rip into .. well.. lots of stuff.

First, we have a scorching denunciation of "Chicago," a broadway musical and recently a film starring Renee Zellweger and Catherine Zeta-Jones.
The acting was over the top, the presentations of the songs were flamboyant, and I was even against the concept of the movie itself. The plot intertwined maliciously with deceit and personal gain both dripping with political quarrels.

Hello? Is there anyone in there who has actually seen a broadway show before? because, you know, they're supposed to be ..well.. flamboyant and over the top. As for the sentence about intertwining plots... is there anyone out there who can decipher it? What does it mean? Anybody? Buehler? IT just doesn't make sense.
This commentator also pans "Forest Gump" and "The Passion of the Christ."

Then we have a jewel of literary criticism in a review of The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. I won't quote any of that blather, except the following, which I found completely ignorant and ridiculous:

Other overrated books include "Ulysses"- the most boring book of all time,
"The Fountainhead"- Ayn Rand creates dumb philosophy, thinks she is perfect
"Wuthering Heights"- Bronte sisters should be raised from the dead and killed again
"Tom Sawyer"- Good Rush song, bad book
"The Bible"- Too many numbers, names, and boring pointless stories, and not enough sex, drugs and rock n roll

I can say nothing about this except that this person has obviously not read the Bible if he/she thinks that there is no sex therein. There is actually quite a bit of sex in the holy writ, you just have to look for it, unlike on the Internet, where T&A is blared from the housetops. I don't know about drugs, but there is some alcoholism happenin' in the Good Book, and as for rock n roll.. I seem to remember kind david getting scolded for his wild dancing in a scripture or two. Psalms.. the rock n roll of its time, I guess.

Finally, these student critics panned.. Ray Charles. And Norah Jones. And Diana Krall. And Natalie Cole, Elton John, B.B. King, James Taylor... Jeezus, do I need to continue? I guess actual music must be out of fashion, when these classic and extremely talented musicians (some of whom are my favorites) can't measure up to P. Diddy or Chingy-or-whuddeva-his-name-is. And has anyone else noticed the lack of young female vocal talent on the airwaves lately? Sure, some of these girls may actually be able to sing, but they don't. All I seem to hear these days on pop or R&B radio is young "ho" wannabees moaning, yodeling, and humping their microphones to a synthesized beat, with a good dose of some guy yelling words that vaguely rhyme in the backgroud. Or the foreground. Whatever works. But that's a different subject entirely..

Oh, for the days of real music... you know, the kind that comes from real instruments..

The Answer to That Nagging Question

I have been away from my new blog, as my readers would notice... if I actually had any readers, that is.
In that time, I have discovered the answer to a question I have asked here already. This particular question has frankly pestered the living hell out of me all my life. That is, why do I feel as if no one listens to me? Why do I feel as if everyone thinks badly of me? Why is it that people can say thousands of good things about me, but at the first negative criticism, I feel as if everyone in the world thinks badly of me and therefore I am not okay?

And the answer is... another question. Why do I care?

You see, this week I was introduced to Ayn Rand and discovered that I have this nagging problem because I am.. a second-hander. A person who has existed on the approval of other people, a person who needs the approval of others to exist. And like Gail Wynand in The Fountainhead, I was never meant to be a second-hander. I know this with complete certainty.

So the question of Why do I think this way? becomes Why do I care? which then becomes What do I think? Maybe it will take me a little while to find my "I." But at least that question is answered.