S My Mother Did to F Me Up, but probably not irreparably

Sent us to school with SALMON salad sandwiches instead of tuna.

Sent us to school with peanut butter and jelly on RYE bread.

Dyed my lovingly faded Levi's BLUE.

Child Services! Bring in the Wonder Bread, bring in the Fluffernutter! Toss the Tintex!

Who Knew I Was So Angry?

Sorry!

:-)  :-)  :-)  :-)  :-)  :-)  :-)  :-)  :-)  :-)  :-)  :-)

See how smiley I can be? Drop by anytime! There's a donut hole in it for ya!

Something for the Fellas: A Mother's Lament Expressed in Sports Metaphors

Jeff/Husband/Dad is due home tonight.  He's on deck, he's warming up in the bullpen.

So bench me, Coach. Send me to the showers, Ump. Throw me in the penalty box, Ref. PUT ME ON THE D.L. -- I have a fake doctor's note! I don't want to play anymore!

And for you dudes who prefer Boomerang Network to the Yankee channel, JANE, GET ME OFF THIS CRAZY THING!

I Can't Get It Up for McGovern Anymore

I don’t know if I have the energy to be a liberal anymore. I don’t even know if I have the energy to be a moderate.

Below is a list of the politicians and organizations who have emailed me over the past 3 days (and today’s only ½ way done) pleading for money and begging for action:

1. People for the American Way
2. Human Rights Campaign
3. BarackObama.com
4. NY.BarackObama.com
5. Bill Clinton
6. MoveOn.org
7. POTUS himself
8. Joe Biden
9. Food & Water Watch
10. Kristen Gillebrand for Senate
11. Rep. Anthony Weiner on behalf of the DCCC

With my limited (or nonexisting) disposable income, where does my $10 go? It’s like choosing among 100 abandoned kittens at an animal shelter. You just wind up crying.

I was hardly a red diaper baby, but my mom had McGovern for President bumper stickers up in the mudroom, and she boycotted grapes and lettuce. When I was in 6^th grade she called the school to insist we watch Carter’s inauguration, and later I wrote a letter to Amy (our cats had the same name).

Silly child, I voted for Mondale, and thought he would win. A woman vice-president! Could it be? My college friends and I went to a Geraldine Ferrara rally, and were thrilled to see Susan Sarandon scuttle by us on the street afterward.

Foolish girl, I voted for Dukakis, and thought he would win. A Jewish first lady! How about that?

Then Bill Clinton, thank God, Bill Clinton! I registered voters, I phone banked till late at night from the office of the UFT in Downtown Brooklyn. I finally voted for a winner. I dreamt about him, even! Not exactly sexual, but sort of sexy. He and another woman and I were spooning – Bill in the middle, natch – on a bed below deck of a yacht. And when he disappointed, I stayed forever, dumbly, true.

A lull next: Gore irritated; Kerry enervated.

But OH! With O we were BACK, baby. My friend Judy and I rode a bus to Philly and canvassed for hours in German Town, making notes on our clipboards when one of our addresses represented a boarded-up house, or one that no longer existed.

When I gathered some mom friends for a monthly night out, I demanded that everyone come with $10 in hand that I would collect and mail in to the campaign. I brought buttons and we all wore them in the bar.

I sent money, and then I sent more money.

And holy shit, holy fucking shit, he did it, we did it. And I rejoiced.

Fast forward to midterm elections and I’ve run out of steam. I can’t take in all those kittens!

I haven’t unsubscribed to any of those emails, but now they go directly to my gmail archive, where they’re a little easier to ignore. The email lists I want to get on? Citizens for Indifference, Americans Advocating Apathy, Join Together to Disengage! I won’t though, I know it. I’m trying to think of a good metaphor for us glutton-for-punishment liberals – maybe Wile E. Coyote? Something or someone cartoonish and elastic. Squish us with an Acme anvil, and we spring back into shape so we can be comically kicked in the face by a kangaroo wearing boxing gloves.

C'mon, up and at 'em before they declare a K.O.

My Baby Takes the Morning Train, goddamn him to hell and back

For my $, the 3 great truth-sayers of the 20^th C:

1. Prince
2. Papa John Philips
3. Karen Carpenter

Match the Monday-bemoaning lyrics to the philosopher who penned them.

a)      Rainy days and Mondays always get me down. Hanging around, nothing to do but frown.

b)      Just another manic Monday, wish it were Sunday, cause that’s my fun day, my I don’t have to run day…

c)      Monday, Monday, can’t trust that day. Every other day of the week is fine, but whenever Monday comes you can find me crying all of the time

Of course none of these geniuses had to get recalcitrant kids up and dressed and fed and off to school on time and get themselves into little office-appropriate get-ups with the light out in the closet while their husband (goddamn him to hell and back) was out of town.

A new coping strategy this a.m. – chanting patience patience patience under my breath – just led me to being anxious anxious anxious, patience times negative 3. 

Tomorrow will try something different, muttering shutthefuckup shutthefuckup shutthefuckup under my breath, alternating with putyoursockson putyoursockson, PUT YOUR DAMN SOCKS ON.

And Wednesday: Homer Simpson-style choking and threats of military school.

Oh, one more thing. Do my eyebrows make me look fat?

David Denby Is a Dick

For non-New Yorker readers, David Denby is the sucky half of two alternating movie critics at the magazine; Anthony Lane is the "scan the Contents and keep your fingers crossed it's  Anthony Lane this week" half.

This week Denby spoils but good the new movie based on Ishiguro Kazuo's Never Let Me Go, with a fuck-you-gentle-reader lack of alert. I read the book (quietly disturbing, slowly suspenseful, modern Gothic with, I think, shades of Shirley Jackson menace), haven't seen the movie. If you read the review... movie spoiled. Done. Hello, Crying Game. The critics - and even the audiences - managed to keep their big fat traps shut on that one. Denby’s just being a pill, spoiling it for everyone. Sad power trip, David. 

Denby's other crime this week? Referring to the "new" Woody Allen movie as intriguing. How intriguing – a male senior citizen leaves his wife of decades for a perky prostitute (heart of gold optional), and suffers some consequences. I rarely get to the movies (first it’s pesky kids [mine], now it’s pesky bedbugs [theirs], keeping me out of movie theaters), and I won’t be seeing this one. Why would I? I’ve seen Woody Allen make this movie a dozen times by now. I don’t care enough about Woody Allen anymore to be angry about the retreads he churns out every year, presumably out of dumb habit; he broke my heart a long time ago.

But Denby – he must be savoring a revenge fantasy – his own wife of many years left him a few years back, for a woman (level of perkiness unknown).

Not dicky enough? Maybe, but Denby will generously provide me with more ammunition on what I like to think of as Anthony Lane’s off-weeks.

Maybe my new thing is ranting not about movies I haven’t seen (I’ll leave that to right-wing extremists; they’re so good at it), but reviews of movies I haven’t seen. Like a 2^nd reviewer, once removed.

Ok, bye.

Lost&Found&Lost

Jeff and I are slogging our way through the last season of formerly addictive Lost, and I never thought I'd hear myself say this, but I DON'T GIVE A SHIT. OR A RAT'S ASS. OR A FLYING FUCK. Or a shitty rat's ass or a rat fucking while flying. Etc. What was once gleefully ridiculous is now tediously, lugubriously, mirthlessly ridiculous. Inevitably, I fall asleep 45 minutes in, and I go, Jeff, what happened, and Jeff goes, I don't know, it doesn't matter. And it doesn't. The only characters I can bear the sight of anymore are Hurley and Miles, the only ones who aren't acting so hard they make my teeth hurt. Claire's hair is a really bad actor, as it turns out. No range, at all. 

It's a self-serious Gilligan's Island now, with new goofy characters emerging from the jungle every episode -- Fu Manchu guy and Evil Locke and always some tough-ass girl with a tank top, sweaty hair, and a gun --  and myriad opportunities to escape, bungled. But without the sophisticated wit, elegant plotting, and adorable costumes of the original tale of our castaways.

Maybe this is my new thing, ranting about shows that are no longer on the air and that everybody stopped caring about 18 months ago. 

Um, ok, bye.