When: 2007-10-18 23:05 You Say What?!: Row Frickin' FF!!! Secure Building: Public Where I'm Sitting: Home, Thank God How I'm Feeling: pissed off What I'm Hearing: "White Rabbit" by Jefferson Airplane Tags: dance recitals, old ladies, rude people

So. I'm at my school's annual Historical Dance Concert. My sister and I are sitting down, enjoying the show, watching the poor people dance on those painful pointe shoes. The concert has already been in full swing for about a good fifteen minutes when this lady, (late fifties, awful dye job in her hair), comes up to us and says--quite loudly and quite rudely-- "You're in our seats! You need to move!"

Okay, 
1) You don't just stand up in the middle of a professional performance and talk loudly. It's on about the rudeness level of bursting out into hysterical laughter at your mother's funeral.
2) You were late to the show. Not my fault if you missed your seats.
3) Let's see your ticket to prove it IS your seat.
4) What's with the "our"? I only see one of you. 

Of course, I don't say any of this. My sister, Hannah, says, "No, these are our seats. 13 and 14, row FF." To which the rude lady replies, "No, this is row EE. Now move!"

Hannah shakes her head, trying to avoid a scene. The lady huffs and storms off, stepping on my feet. Hannah and I go back to watching the dance, but maybe two minutes later, the lady comes back and announces, "These are our seats, and I'm not going to keep walking around like this. Move it!" When Hannah and I don't move, she sits down on my lap.

Sits. Down. On. MY. Lap.

1) I cannot SEE.
2) She keeps trying to shove me over, resulting in jabbing my thigh into the arm, which gave me a bruise later.
3) WTF?! You don't just sit in people's lap!

But the lady stays there, and not only take, she turns to the person sitting next to us and declares, "I TOLD them to move. God, I cannot BELIEVE how RUDE teenagers are!" The person gives her an odd, why-the-heck-are-you-talking-to-me look and proceeds to ignore her. She, however, keeps jabbering on about how rude my sister and I are. I, just try to ignore the fact that this stranger is on MY LAP and watch the show. The dance is over in about five minutes; Hannah and I quickly stand up and move down THREE SEATS to some unoccupied spots while the techies change the stage. I can still hear the lady bad-mouthing us to any who will listen.

The show continues and is great. Intermission comes up and as Hannah and I leave the theater, I check the row number: FF. OUR row.

Once we are outside, Hannah turns to me and sums up the whole experience: "What a BITCH!"

When: 2007-09-30 18:30 You Say What?!: A Pearl of Wisdom from "Little Miss Sushine" Secure Building: Public Where I'm Sitting: Fifteen Miles East of Mayhem How I'm Feeling: contemplative What I'm Hearing: Avenue Q Soundtrack Tags: life, little miss sunshine

Oh, how I love this movie. I adore indie movies, and this is perhaps my favorite independent film of them all. If teaching doesn't ever pan out for me, I'd love to get into screenwriting for indie films... or perhaps television. Or voice acting.

Anyway. About Little Miss Sunshine.

If you haven't seen it, where have you been?! Yes, yes, I'm aware that it is R so some kids can't see it because of parental issues. But seriously, it's only R because of some language. Not like every teenager in America hasn't already heard the F-Bomb before....

If you haven't seen it, I'll give you a two-second summary: a dysfunctional family travels to California so that their youngest can enter a beauty-contest. If it sounds cheesy, believe me, it's not.

Anyway. Here comes the point of this little speal. Towards the end of the film, Frank (played by Steve Carell, one of my favorite actors), and Dwayne, (played by Paul Dano, my personal choice to play "Fang" if the Maximum Ride is Live-Action), share a very enlightening conversation:

DWAYNE: I wish I could just sleep until I was eighteen and skip all this crap- high school and everything- just skip it.
 
FRANK: You know Marcel Proust? 

DWAYNE: He's the guy you teach. 

FRANK: Yeah. French writer. Total loser. Never had a real job. Unrequited love affairs. Gay. Spent 20 years writing a book almost no one reads. But he's also probably the greatest writer since Shakespeare. Anyway, he uh... he gets down to the end of his life, and he looks back and decides that all those years he suffered, Those were the best years of his life, 'cause they made him who he was. All those years he was happy? You know, total waste. Didn't learn a thing. So, if you sleep until you're 18... Ah, think of the suffering you're gonna miss. I mean high school? High school- those are your prime suffering years. You don't get better suffering than that. 

DWAYNE: You know what? Fuck beauty contests. Life is one fucking beauty contest after another. School, then college, then work... Fuck that. And fuck the Air Force Academy. If I want to fly, I'll find a way to fly. You do what you love, and fuck the rest.

Words of wisdom.

I've recently come to a decision about my life. I'm spending about six hours a night doing homework. I spend another eight in school, and another eight to sleeping and eating. And those final two hours left? Yeah, I spend those driving to and from school. I mean, god. What kind of life is that? I mean, sure, I want to get into a good college, get a good job, and everything. but I don't want to lose my soul in the process. What's the point?

So now... I'm focusing on what I WANT, and then what I NEED. I'm eating my dessert first. I'm watching TV and surfing the internet before homework. I'm hanging out more... screw school and chores. 

And you know what else? I'm going to make it. My childhood may have been full of a whole lot of abuse-crap, but I'm not going to let that bring me down. And I'm not hiding it. It's part of who I am. It's not pretty, but then again, what is? There is nothing pretty about life. To quote the everlasting William Goldman, "Life isn't fair. Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something."

    

When: 2007-09-15 13:46 You Say What?!: That Tree is Looking at Me Funny... Secure Building: Public Where I'm Sitting: Kitchen Table How I'm Feeling: amused What I'm Hearing: Much as I Hate To Admit It, I'm Listening to J-Pop. Tags: nature, webcomics

You know, I truly hate nature. It's icky and nasty and full of bugs and things that make me itchy. Seems that whenever I go outside, I find out I'm allergic to something new.
Nature sucks. Mother Earth can kiss my pale butt.

(Before any tree-huggers attack me, I strongly believe in protecting the environment. Because, you know, we kind of need it. We live on it, and we eat parts of it. Much as I hate nature, I wouldn't want it to disappear. I recycle everything I can possibly recycle, I reuse things, I don't litter-- I even pick up other people's litter.) 

Anyway, I was trolling through the internet, checking out some webcomics instead of doing homework, and I discovered this lovely comic from Giant in the Playground Games.

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0150.html

I love Order of the Stick, mostly because I find role-playing games so silly. No offense guys, but Scrabble totally kicks Dungeons and Dragons' butt. But also because they hit so many things right on the nail head-- like this one about trees.

Anyway. Really must get on that homework.