you only get one shot.

people always tell you: "don't smoke cigarettes or crack. they will cause addiction and the latter will likely lead to homelessness/whitney houston-like insanity." but nobody ever says to you (except that sometimes they do), "don't drink pepsi one. it will cause addiction and the most persistent migraines known to man." well, i am giving this piece of advice to you and myself in writing because i need constant reminders. i was totally in recovery, not depending on the sweet chemical taste or the caffeine fix, and then i had some stressful times, and i fell back into the three a day habit, and for a few days now, i have had a headache that ibuprofen simply will not remedy. but the most fucked up part is that i am still drinking pepsi one. this must end... tonight.

tomorrow evening i'm going to germany. this is where i spent the majority of my childhood, and i haven't seen it since i turned twelve, so i guess i am excited. but i am also slightly apprehensive. i fear my german will not be as fluent as it was when it was my primary language, and everyone will ridicule me for it. because germans are assholes. i'm pretty sure that's where i get it from... my heritage. i also am not looking forward to a nine-hour plane ride. but it won't be with american airlines, so i think i can expect some snacks and movies and things that make planes more enjoyable.

i hope the two weeks go by quickly. mostly because i am all about time passing swiftly for the next few months. i hope i have a nice time. i intend to drink publicly at every opportunity, so this should help.

PS i am going to be in the atlanta airport. please, forces of the universe, let me see someone more famous than beth ditto.

this is not what i asked for.

when i was making my way back to the south, i had a two hour layover in portland. i was pretty fucking despondent upon landing because i had to get up several hours prior to the crack of dawn but primarily because of a handsome young lad unfortunately located in spokane. upon landing, i discovered my next flight was delayed for an hour, which could have potentially fucked my other connection to get to atlanta, which was now scheduled to depart about 10 minutes after my delayed flight landed. so, i was forced to sit in the terminal, miserable, tired and anxious, for about three hours.

as time passed, the gate area filled up, and this group of loud, dirty, douchey-looking hipsters sat in the row across from me. because they were not using library voices, i could overhear their conversations with ease. they talked about guitars and basketball and how they hoped their luggage was now going to make it onto the plane since they were late, but the flight was delayed. and how much it would suck to have to wear these boots in miami, their final destination, for a week if it didn't. and what to tell your doctor to get certain prescription medications, like ambien and xanax. i also watched them play on the walking escalator things you find in airports. the entire duration of my waiting period i kept thinking, "you people are obnoxious," and, "the chubby girl looks oddly familiar." then i got on the plane, seated far away from any of these people, and continued to soak in my misery.

today i was doing my daily celebrity gossip browsing and saw the following:

that is beth ditto. she is the singer in a group called the gossip, who i have read about on lots of occasions but never actually listened to. i'm pretty sure the only reason i am at all familiar with them is because beth ditto usually does things like this:





i for some reason thought that the gossip were british. but i think that's just because people actually care about them in england. so, when i saw that orange-haired girl this morning, i immediately thought, "she looks just like that person whose obnoxiousness kept me distracted from my depression at the pdx airport," and moved on. but i kept thinking about it today, so i did a little bit of investigating to find out that a) beth ditto is from arkansas, not england. b) she was voted the coolest person in rock by nme magazine c) the gossip is based in portland, oregon and d) they performed at some art thing in miami at the beginning of december.

underwhelming conclusion: i finally saw (someone who is considered) a celebrity (by some people) up close in an airport and didn't even realize it or give a shit.

obviously, i have been robbed. why wasn't it a famous rapper in atlanta, like i have been politely requesting for the last two and a half years? or kim kardashian? or just someone i would have instantly recognized and wanted to take a picture with, huh? this would have without a doubt made me feel better at the time. now i am left feeling empty and cheated because that was probably my only "get to see a celebrity at an airport" card, and i accidentally used it up on this bitch. it's not even a cool fucking story.

fuck my life.

it's like i don't even know who i am anymore.

throughout the rise in popularity of leggings and tights i have firmly preached one truth and that is that they are not pants. if you wouldn't wear whatever is covering your upper half without the leggings because it would leave your buttock-area inappropriately exposed, then you should not be wearing it without pants. real, certified pants with pockets. this was my personal standard, and i felt that everyone else on the planet should abide by it as well because i know best. mary-kate olsen could evoke something more positive than a "girl, please," from me when she temporarily quit pants for black tights.

but a few days ago, i broke my rule. i left the house in a plaid shirt that covered my ass in its entirety, yet could not be considered socially acceptable for non-prostitutes without the tights i paired with it. i was walking a thin line, i realize. since this, i have been ardently defending myself to myself and others, even when they have not reproached me. it was strangely liberating, not wearing pants. and comfortable. and i want to do it again. but i feel like this would make me a sell-out. at least i am not wearing uggs (yet).

another issue i am currently dealing with is that i am growing to tolerate, maybe even kind of like katy perry. "i kissed a girl" was catchy, but too obnoxious to like. i don't know if i hated it because a) it trivialized homosexuality, b) every drunk girl has kissed one of her own and probably didn't mind it, so why write a song about this fact of life and pretend to be bold, katy perry? or c) because every time it came on the radio when i was in the presence of my mother, i feared she would ask, "have you ever kissed a girl, stephanie?," and i would not be able to lie convincingly enough in my response. now that it's not being forced into my ears eight times daily, it doesn't seem so awful. and should i happen to be in the presence of the current katy perry single, "hot n cold" (ugh.) i will totally bop along to that shit. it cannot be helped.

i also frequently feel the urge to be doing domestic things, such as baking or crafty activties. and instead of working on my final projects, the due dates to which are approaching rapidly, i am simply pretending they do not exist.

forever young.

i am super into baby pictures. any baby pictures, really. this should not really come as a surprise because i am interested in baby anythings. like these mindblowingly adorable orange kittens i saw today up for adoption. when i am a responsible adult who is not afraid of commitment, the first thing i will do is get a kitten to call my own and name it something really witty/badass/original. but i digress. i really want to talk about these old pictures i found recently. i know my parents care for me, and i suppose you could say i have turned out alright, but i do question some of their parenting decisions.

here i am, about a year old, drinking beer:
this type of behavior helps to explain why i look a tiny bit shitfaced in so many photographs of my toddler times. like these:



this next picture seems normal to the untrained eye. i still have the frames to those glasses i'm wearing and still plan on filling them with my prescription. but let me draw your attention to my sweater.
it's sort of hard to tell in this version. but it appears to read "ethnic heart romance." i'm pretty sure it was purchased in germany, yet this is no excuse because a)my mother should have spoken enough english to know better and b)my american father definitely knew better. also, who decided to put that text on a child's sweater in the first place. or anyone's sweater, really?

the most troubling photographic discovery i found was one of me on fasching, which is sort of like mardi gras, when i was seven years old. i remember that my costume was "punk rocker" but it looks a little more like "baby prostitute." does it not?

i have flown with a lot of different airlines. i have had negative experiences with most of them, but sometimes the airline itself cannot be blamed when the weather is really at fault. even though i realize this, i am generally convinced all airlines are out to fuck me.

most recently i flew with american airlines, who i would not recommend. i don't really know anything about them, but they seem a little low budget. this would not be an issue at all if that's what i had expected. but the price i paid for the ticket did not lead me to believe this was the motel 6 of the air travel world. usually on long flights they try to meet your entertainment needs by showing an in-flight movie or once i was on a plane that had tv screens in the backs of all the seats and you could watch three hours of project runway on bravo and just enjoy your life, despite being on an airplane. they also usually give you some peanuts or crackers or pretzels for free. american airlines does not provide any of these services. and their planes are fucking tiny and uncomfortable.

they also make you pay to check your baggage, which i understood when it was making up for profits lost while gas was $6859 barrel, but now that it's significantly lower, they could probably get rid of this fee. i'm even more sure they could get rid of this fee because my flight to spokane was operated by american airlines all the way up to my last transfer in portland, when it swtiched to horizon, so i had to pay twenty bucks or something to check my bag. my flight back to the ATL started out with the 50-minute horizon flight to portland (on which they serve free snacks! by the way), and then turned into american airlines. when i checked my luggage in spokane, with horizon, nobody prompted me to give them my money. confused, i said to the horizon employee, "i don't have to pay for this?" to which he replied, "no." even though american airlines was going to be carrying my shit for about five times they amount of time horizon was. fuck american airlines, i say.

anyway, this is irreverent and funny, yet not lacking in message:

See more Jack Black videos at Funny or Die

my main squeeze.

i used to judge people who dressed up their dogs. i would pretend to ask these pet owners, "why are you doing that to this poor animal?" now i know. because forcing your dogs to wear human clothes is fun!

i felt the urge to outfit my dogs on numerous occasions, but i fought it by telling myself, "stephanie, you are not that person." but i also used to genuinely believe i had a type b personality. obviously i don't always know myself as well as i think i do.

so, here's my dog woody looking like a fly son of a bitch (pun not really intended).





i wish his eye glowed like that in person.

like that old, kind of sexist showtune goes..

i enjoy being a girl.

except for when my uterus feels like it's trying to separate itself from my body.

thanks, menstruation!

loving, as always.

my brother: what is this movie called?
my mother: the good german.
my dad, glancing at my german mother: ...it's a fairy tale.

still waiting for an ATL sequel, to be honest.

i woke up after receiving not nearly enough sleep. i am a solid seven hours minimum kind of girl. if this condition is not met, i am automatically programmed to be miserable until i can complete a nap, which i have at this point and incidentally feel much better. one of the many times i was unnecessarily awakened throughout the night can be attributed to dewey, my cat, lover and friend, making this awful hacking noise that only signals one thing: hairball. it was approximately 4:17 AM, but i can tell you that upon realizing what was about to take place at the end of my bed, i thought loudly, "OH, HELL NAW!" and like one swift motherfucker, i scooped up dewey and escorted him outside in a matter of seconds. crisis averted.

i straightened my hair yesterday, so when i woke up i did not look, as my father sometimes puts it, "like medusa." this allowed me to sleep for an extra half an hour in lieu of showering. probably one of the best decisions i've ever made.

i like to plan ahead, and because i know that on days i am tired, there is a chance i will find time to sleep in my car in the school parking lot, which usually results in dry contacts for the rest of the day. in anticipation of this chain of events i wore my glasses, but you can't wear glasses when you are applying eye make-up. i am pretty adept at this process as i have been doing it for centuries (..not quite), yet i somehow managed to stab myself in the eye about three different times. so, i was not really feeling this wednesday morning. but then, on my drive to school, i hit EVERY SINGLE red light. when i was born, god or whatever gives you magical powers said, "let this girl be able to avoid 90 percent of all red lights, usually by staring at them really hard to keep them green." but i was definitely off today because i was so tired. so i couldn't focus my precious energy on the traffic lights. it took me ridiculously long to get to school.

the bright side (i am quite the optimist) is that because it took me so long, i got to listed to "live your life" by t.i. featuring rihanna like 85030 times. i remember when i first heard it i thought, "is this really sampling that numa numa shit from several years ago?" and that was it. i could not get past the beginning bars. i refused to take it seriously. but i am an idiot because it is totally my jam and revolutionizing my life.

there is some incongruity in the message of the lyrics, because in the verses t.i. sort of implies that money isn't everything and you need to get your priorities straight, but in the chorus rihanna is all, "you're gonna be a shining star. in fancy clothes and faaaancy caa-aars" and "i'm a pay-pah chay-sah." (that is rihannian for "paper chaser." we all know she is not the best at pronouncing things accurately. she did turn umbrella into four syllables.) but whatever, i can totally still relate.

and, honestly, who can't identify with lyrics like, "i pray for patience, but they make me want to melt they face away?" (this is basically the story of my life.) and who hasn't dealt with people who "said they sold yay and no,they couldn't get work on labor day?" i certainly have. but i most poignantly connect to the description of being "articulate, but still i'll grab a nigga by the collah quick."

so live your life, ayyyyyyy ayyy ayyyyy.

i do not endorse true blood.

i was haphazardly trying to find something to watch, and i noticed there was a true blood marathon on hbo. i knew the following: it's about vampires, and anna paquin is on it. in an effort to learn more, i decided to rest the remote. i cannot say i was necessarily enthralled by the show's premise of vampires struggling to be accepted by society in louisiana. but it's an hbo show, so people kept having sex and nothing else was on. therefore i stayed tuned.

i continued to watch for three hours, attempting to discern my feelings about the show. i wanted to like it, but it was just too fucking weird. like, at one point anna paquin got the shit kicked out of her and had to consume her vampire-friend's blood to survive. so he (the vampire) bit a chunk out of his wrist, and she sucked on it for a long time in a way one might suck on another male appendage. so, that was awkward to watch.

a few episodes later, anna paquin's womanizing brother drank a whole vile of vampire blood, resulting in the word's most unrelenting erection. i knew it was time for me to move on when he announced something along the lines of, "i feel like i have gout of the dick."

that was definitely the deal breaker. but a minor, yet persistent issue i had with the show was that anna paquin's character is named "sookie," which is so incredibly unpleasant to my ears. it invokes an inexplicable hatred in me, sort of like drew barrymore. i wish it was pronounced like "soupy," but it isn't. and until this changes, i don't want to hear it. ever.

fuck that shit.

sometimes people say things to me regarding myself that make me wonder which of the following scenarios is occuring 1) people are intrepreting me all wrong or 2) i am severely lacking in self-awareness. because people make declarations about me that sort of baffle me, like once a stranger in an elevator told me i "seem like a really happy person" at a point when this was definitely not applicable. more recent cases have been "i thought you were a hardcore emo chick" (um, what?) or today's, "you put on your stripper boots!" (for the record, they are black, non-patent, flat, below the knee boots. and while i occasionally may dabble in sporting dresses that are perhaps dangerously close to hovering at the labia, today was not one of them.) in summary, i frequently appear to be really happy, annoyingly depressed, and kind of easy.

i recently had an epiphany where i determined that it would probably just be in my best interest to major in journalism because it's been a career-path i keep coming back to, and i sort of want to be gloria steinem. or chuck klosterman. or carrie bradshaw. but then today i met with my adviser and realized there is no way i can happily attend this school for another semester, let alone three, before transferring. this triggered a familiar freakout centering around my inability to make and execute plans for my life.

but it's cool because i know i'm going to stumble into a large sum of money soon, which i will use to buy a nice little house someplace pleasant. then i am going to have a garden and learn about things i care about and maybe go on some philanthropic adventures. i am also going to be stoned all the time again. i will have you over for dinner.

i never know how to feel about beyonce. i love her pretty much any time i associate her with jay-z. it warms my heart to think about how they did "bonnie and clyde '03" and in 2008, it really does appear that nothing and no one will ever come between them.

beyonce is at her best when she is spiteful and a little vindictive (see: "ring the alarm," "irreplaceable") or when she was in destiny's child. most other times she is kind of annoying (see: dreamgirls, interviews, l'oreal commercials). also, her upcoming album is entitled i am... sasha fierce, and i honestly can't comprehend how the people at her record label allowed her to do this.

for some bizarre reason, two singles and videos were released simultaneously for this album. one is a terribly unoriginal and sappy ballad called, "if i were a boy," which i hate so much i don't even want to think about it. the other is the much better "single ladies (put a ring on it)," which sends a clear message to fellas that if you and your lady break up, you have no right to be angry when another man wants to hit it. because if you liked it then you should have put a ring on it.

just like i know that "ring the alarm" was created solely to ensure that no woman will ever go near jay-z as long as beyonce lives, i like to think this song is the reason they got married. i imagine beyonce was like, "hey jigga man, i'm working on this new song. wanna hear it?" of course he obliged. upon completion of the song, he asked, "b, you trying to tell me something?" and she probably said, "i don't know, jay. but remember how pissed i got in the 'ring the alarm' video and how fast i got a new boyfriend in 'irreplaceable'?" and the rest is history.

as a song, "single ladies" is pretty beyonce-like, but the video is... a surprising choice. my initial reaction was literally, "haha... what?" however, i have since watched it an estimated seventeen times and never fail to be greatly entertained by it. although i still don't fully -- or partially -- understand the robotic hand. he didn't put a ring on it, so she cut it off?

i'm a mouse, duh.

yesterday was halloween, which i don't care about. i'm not just saying that because i am socially challenged at this point in my life. even when i was in high school i never dressed up. (except for when i had a slutty halloween party my senior year. lolz.) i attribute my indifference to halloween to not being able to come up with sweet-ass, original costume ideas yet not wanting to wear something mediocre.

while i usually don't feel the need to personally involve myself with halloween, there is nothing i love more than the sight of a cute baby in a costume. (is this sounding a little a pedo? i assure you it's not.) my neighbors' baby was dressed as a lion, a costume i too once donned as a wee one. another adorable child was a fucking dragon. i'm pretty sure i could hear my ovaries firing off eggs to be fertilized.

on an unrelated note, i used to be totally into remembering my dreams. i would say i'm pretty good at making these recollections. however, i am wishing i could lose this ability because my good to bad dream ratio has consistently been shifting in favor of the negatives. two nights ago i had one where i was in this house with no lights, which was apparently mine, and there was a man who was in an excruciating amount of pain and a baby with a bleeding wound. they were both screaming loudly and it was my responsibility to find the man's painkillers and some gauze to bandage the baby with since we were in my house. i was frantically rummaging through all of these messy, unorganized cupboards in the dark, while the man and baby were screaming and crying and screaming, but all i could find were useless medicines and two passports belonging to my family members.

then last night i had a nice dream where some strange woman told me she liked my eyebrows. so i would say my dream cycle was off to a good start. naturally, this experience was short-lived, as i had this other very realistic, untheatrical dream that was so fucking unpleasant, it caused me to wake up, and i had to be all, "stephanie, check yo self. it's 4 AM and this did not just happen."

like this.

there is a pregnant woman in my biology class, and today she was saying that she has been having the worst cravings for mcdonald's french fries, but the company supports things that she doesn't agree with, so she doesn't eat there. i was thinking something along the lines of violating animal rights or shitty food quality. but then she said that they contributed money to gay and lesbian organizations, and she would not give them her patronage "for the future of my children." to which i should have said, "yeah, because all of those homosexuals wanting equal rights are such an imminent danger to your family, you dumb bitch." but who wants to fight a pregnant lady?

luckily, my biology professor is this wonderful sudanese man who is rather soft-spoken and has an adorable accent. i was so enamored by him i could not be fully outraged by her ridiculousness. my professor sports a lot of creative outfits, especially for someone who is about sixty years old. today, for example, he was wearing a collared shirt under a multi-color striped beige sweater. over the sweater he had a similarly colored beige blazer with a tiny brown plaid pattern and a matching newsboy cap. he was wearing gray slacks and, to complete the ensemble, brown/beige NIKE DUNKS. i told him i liked his outfit. in response to which he raised his arms, did a spin and said, "thank you, thank you!"

and i died.

i should be studying for my biology test. but i have my priorities.

first, here is an open letter to kanye west:

dear yeezy,

i have loved you since i was fourteen. that's five years of dedication, which is a lot for someone a)so young and b)so fickle. i love you because you dropped out of college and are living the dream. and because, despite that bloated ego of yours, you have a lot of talent. and because you used to have soul. now you have these weird-ass drum tracks and auto-tune.

i stuck with you through a lot of bullshit. for example, pretty much half of the songs on graduation. and all those pictures of nearly naked skanks on your blog. but like hannah montana preaches, "nobody's perfect," or so i said to myself.

but i have had enough. i have to break up with you because you have really been losing your touch lately. with every new song that surfaces from your upcoming album, i tell myself, "keep an open mind. you can learn to love this shit." but i can't. and i don't want to. because when you really love someone, it should come instinctively.

when you first wanted to rap everyone was all, "you can't rap, youz a producer." and you showed them wrong. and i guess now you are trying to show everyone you're a singer. but... is it really singing when it's auto-tuned?

so, i wish you the best of luck. i hope you understand, and maybe we can still be friends.

yours,
Stephanie


second:

the new object of my affection, and kanye's replacement, is girl talk aka greg gillis. i remember sort of casually listening to a song here and there a year or two ago and thinking it was cool but not really investigating any futher. a few nights ago i downloaded the entire girl talk discography and lost my shit. WHY DIDN'T ANYBODY BOTHER TO TELL ME THAT I NEEDED THIS IN MY LIFE?!! i sort of want to punch any friend of mine who was aware of girl talk's existence and didn't make this recommendation.

who knew it was possible to sample both neutral milk hotel and that song that goes, "i need a dime that's top of the line. cute face, little waist and a big behind" within seconds of each other and make it sound fucking awesome? greg gillis did. or who would dare to couple someone rapping about "getting some head" with sinead o'connor's "nothing compares 2 u?" i think you know the answer.

he even somehow manages to utilize avril lavigne's "girlfriend" in a way that is not entirely annoying.

i am going to be mrs. girl talk. i'm sure of it. and we won't even have to hire a dj for the reception!

samantha brown must die.

every time passport to (some place awesome) with samantha brown is on my beloved travel channel, i think to myself, "why is this bitch living my life?"

she is barely tolerable most of the time. she is perpetually awkward and makes the lamest jokes. i've seen her consume alcohol in several episodes, and not even this appears to allow her to relax. and yet she somehow convinced people to give her the opportunity to go see all sorts of wonderful places, while meeting interesting people and eating good food.

i would make a much better travel show host than samantha brown. passport to (whatever the season's theme is) with stephanie proft. sounds like an improvement from the original, right?

everybody cares.

i projectile vomited all over my room last night. i am sort of a chronic oversharer, so i will not divulge details. except that the last thing i ate was lasagna and it was everywhere. today was spent trying to convince my body not to throw up again. it worked, but i still feel pretty barfy.

a somewhat related question: why have celebrities taken it upon themselves to ensure that young people are encouraged to vote? it's not that i disagree with the sentiment that the youth should be active in choosing its representation. i just think it's worrisome if ludacris or jessica alba was the primary motivation to get you to fill out that voter's registration card.

and why do these frivolous celebrities feel they are qualified to give political endorsements? i would bet kanye declared scarlett johansson as his favorite white girl because she is hot, not because she openly endorses barack obama. because i don't think anyone actually gives two shits about her political views, and i think the same goes for virtually every other celebrity who has given his or her endorsement, which is typically for obama (because everyone knows that conservatives do not possess the necessary shining personalities or talent to become famous.. jay kay!!).

i am so glad that elections only happen every four years; i could not possibly stand this fuckery if it occured at smaller intervals. i actually wish this election would just be overwith. i think there is really only so much that can be said about either of the tickets, and we have reached a point where no new arguments are being made. people are just rehashing the same issues, and i think most people having these arguments are fairly set in their opinions, which makes the discussions completely useless and annoying.

finally, liberals and socialists are not offended by being called "a liberal" and/or "socialist." so it is ineffective to use these terms as intended insults.

i need this in my life.

i'm going to germany for the first time since i was twelve this christmas. i am very excited. i happent to stem from the best part of germany, bavaria. more specifically, i was born in a town called lichtenfels, which is world renowned for being the "german basket city." (fun fact: lichtenfels is actually not that well-known, even among germans.) i think this is reason enough to justify that bavaria is the best region of the country. but if it isn't, i will argue that we speak with the cutest of all the german dialects. it might actually be the only cute german dialect, upon further thought. i would equate it to the american southerner's accent. not so much because bavaria is located in the southern portion of germany, but because it sounds adorably unrefined.

so anyway, i really want someone to get me this dirndl:
(excuse her face, please.)




to celebrate my bavarian heritage on special occasions. or to wear around my house on a daily basis while i bake apfelstrudel and serve overflowing beer mugs to a very fortunate and appreciative man. whichever occurs first.

gross.

i have a few really obvious defects that are a part of my character and being somewhat obsessive is certainly one of them. sometimes my preoccupations are directed at people i will probably never meet (kanye west, ridiculous celebrities), but other times they are concerned with horrifying yet highly unlikely possibilities. for example, when i was fourteen, i found out that honda is manufacturing robots, and there is chance that these machines could become a part of our society. naturally, i started considering what would happen if these bitches malfunction and kill and/or sabotage their owners, and for a good three years i was regularly haunted by the prospect of evil robots. i am sort of over it, at this point. but i still don't feel like i ever need to see that will smith movie that is basically an enactment of this fear.

as the saying goes, out with the old semi-irrational fear, in with the new. i recently was made aware of a bodily phenomenon known as a "prolapse," which is best described, i guess, as an event where certain organs that should remain on the inside of your body, fall out of place and then suddenly become visible to outside viewers. i think the most terrifying and well-known kinds of prolapses are those of the anus and uterus. YOUR ASSHOLE AND VAGINA , ladies, CAN TURN THEMSELVES INSIDE OUT.

i know it sounds scary, but wait till curiosity gets the better (or worst, i'd say) of you, and you decide to google for pictures. i know i am prone to speak in hyperbole, but it is seriously the most fucking horrifying thing i have ever laid eyes upon and makes me want to die. the worst one was a picture of a man whose anus prolapsed while he was doing some heavy weightlifting. and i cannot get it out of my head. all day i've been having visions of these godawful pictures, praying that my anus and vagina stay strong and never let anything fall out of there, other than the usual things.

what is most shocking is that you never really hear about this shit, but i'd say it's far more terrifying than cancer or aids, which you hear about all the time. i think we need to invest more in cultivating prolapse awareness and how to prevent it. because no one should ever have to see, let alone experience something so incredibly disgusting.

i hope this does not happen again.

i don't think that i'm what people would describe as "approachable." i'm not sure why. i think it may have something to do with the fact that i have a condition best described as "bitch face," where i look sort of smug and/or irritable at all times unless i am smiling. no one has ever told me this directly, but i have been accused of smirking at times i didn't even realize i was doing it, and my mother often tells me to "stop making that face" when my face just naturally falls that way.


today i got out of class fifteen minutes early, and i was sitting on a bench waiting for my next class, minding my own business. and this complete stranger mumbles something at me. to which i replied, "huh?" and the following conversation ensued.


boy: you cold?
me: not really.. it's just raining.
boy: what's your name?
me: stephanie. what's yours?
boy: ta-mumble.
me: what is it?
boy: ta-mumble.
me: oh.
boy: mumble mumble.
me: what was that?
boy: do you stay round here.. in phenix city?
me: like, do i live here? yeah.
boy: (not even looking in my general direction) mumble mumble.
me: (assuming this was not an important comment or even meant for me, did not reply)

a few moments later.

boy: (this time at me) mumble mumble boyfriend?
me: do i have a boyfriend?
boy: yeah.
me: no.
boy: can i get yo number to call you sometime. take you out?
me: uhhh... sure.

i then proceeded to give him my digits because i could not bring myself to say no. although i was pretty baffled at the request, considering how awful our interaction was going. he asked me if i would call or text him sometime. i said i might, but i won't. this young man and i do not have a future. i can tell. mostly because i can't understand a damn word he says. also, because i asked him for his name twice, and i still don't know what comes after the first syllable and at this point, can't really ask again. oh, and because it was literally one of the most uncomfortable conversations of my life.

please do not call me, ta-mumble. please do not call.

debbie downer.

so, the election is less than a month away. i'm not even excited to vote at all anymore. partially because i live in alabama, which is very much a red state so my vote matters even less than others. but moreso, i am not even remotely stoked about either of the candidates at this point. i don't really think that obama is the beacon of integrity he is being painted as, but i fundamentally disagree with john mccain on a variety of topics. and i would shit if palin made it to the white house as the first female vice president, for a vast array of reasons.

i am starting to wonder how much of this economic crisis is just being perpetuated by fear mongering. it almost seems like a self-fulfilling prophecy at this point. i obviously realize that there are legitimate fears and problems, but the stock market correlates so much with the confidence of investors. i don't think it helps for increasing amounts of bleak predictions to be put into rotation by the media. or maybe i am just being naive, and we really are in a terrible global crisis. i am just deluding myself as a coping mechanism. either way, i am still having a hard time attempting to subdue my inner panic.

something else that has become increasingly irritating to me the more i think about it are those stupid fucking totes that say things like, "i am not a plastic bag" or "save the planet" or something else proving the carrier's moral superiority. don't get me wrong. i think it's wonderful to avoid plastic and love trees. the environment is not my number one concern, but i've never thought of being wasteful as an attractive quality. my issue with these bags is that they are primarily not grocery bags. they are sold in stores that don't even sell groceries. those reuseable cloth bags they do sell at grocery stores cost, like, a dollar, which seems extremely reasonable for something you use to carry your food purchases from the store to your house while being considerate of planet earth. the bags in question cost considerably more.

the thing is that when people buy these eco-friendly seeming bags, they really should be using them as a substitute to something that is damaging to the environment. otherwise the self-righteous proclaimation on the item itself just seems a little silly, not to mention douchey. my bet is that most people use their "tree hugger" tote to carry things such as a wallet, cell phone, lip balm (organic, i bet), gum, maybe some tampons, etc. when was the last time you saw a person with a home carry these items in a plastic bag? probably never. because women tend to contain these essentials in something called a purse, which is typically reusable and not made of plastic bags.

so use your non-plastic bag (that was probably produced by little vietnamese girls for 60 cents an hour) to carry your goddamned groceries and not personal items. because it makes you look like an asshole.

i would like to marry this song.

perfection.

this culminates in an overshare, i'm sure.

i have been having headaches more frequently recently than i have in a long time. they are awful, and i hate them. i started experiencing them when i was about seven, and my mom took me to the doctor, where they connected a lot of wires to my head and did various tests and suggested i check my vision and stay away from chocolate, as i appeared to be allergic. at that point my vision was fine, and i have never noticed any correlation between my migraines and chocolate consumption. anyway, i don't really worry about the headaches because if it was a brain tumor or something, i'm sure that after twelve years this would have become a serious issue.

while the headaches are old news, during the past week or i've had about three nosebleeds, which is the same amount i have had during my entire lifetime until now. it is freaking me out a little. but i have no intention of visiting a doctor about this. mostly because webmd told me that nosebleeds are usually not so serious.

my most exciting nosebleed experience happened earlier when i was sitting on my bed, and something caused me to let out a chuckle, which forced some air out through my nose, which also also happened to spray blood spatter all over my pillow. pretty awesome.

so warm.

the weather is one of my favorite things to complain about. when i lived in idaho, i complained about the ridiculous cold. when i lived in portland, i hated the incessant suicide-inducing gray and wetness. now that i'm in the south, i have dealt surprisingly well with the most obvious unpleasant condition, humidity, (oh, and hurricanes and tornadoes) but am becoming increasingly annoyed by the fact that it is still almost ninety degrees at the end of september.

doesn't the weather know that i have recently acquired several cardigans/jacket-type items that cannot be worn at such high temperatures? i find it pretty inconsiderate.

but, in an effort to not be such a negative nancy, i shall not complain about the warmth because i promise that i would take sunny and warm over cold, gray, and shitty (i'm looking at you, portland) any day. well, maybe not literally any day. the occasional rainy day does have a certain charm. however, i think that a pool or lake in my backyard would make me far more appreciative of the fact that it's so summery for nearly half the year. if someone could hook that up, i would let you swim in the aforementioned body of water with me, guaranteed.

dinner conversation.

yesterday at dinner i was sitting in front of my food waiting for my mother and brother to be done preparing their plates and anticipating my mother's prayer she usually delivers before the meal. she noticed i hadn't started eating.

mom: (excitedly) oh, you want me to say grace?
me: well, i was sort of expecting it since you say it every night. but i would feel fine eating my food without it.
mom: i can't believe you said that.. (pause)
dear heavenly father, please save stephanie from an eternity in hell.

my anaconda don't want none.

so, i read the book of laughter and forgetting, which is by milan kundera. and in one of the stories he talks about how people are becoming more and more inclined to think of themselves as writers because "everyone has trouble accepting the fact that he will disappear unheard of and unnoticed in an indifferent universe, and everyone wants to make himself into a universe of words before it's too late. once the writer in every individual comes to life (and that time is not far off), we are in for an age of universal deafness and lack of understanding."

he was obviously foreshadowing the blogging phenomenon. after reading that little quote i began to feel even more vain about rambling on the internet than i had to begin with. that and the idea of milan kundera being pissed off in the afterlife, partially on my account, kept me far away from this shit.

but i don't really think that anybody is paying attention, and i bought a real journal for my ~feelings~, which i think will prevent me from composing unnecessary diatribes about my dissatisfaction with life and posting them on the internet.

enough with the justifications, i just really want to comment on this:



kim kardashian is one hot bitch, whose claim to fame is her gravity-defying ass. honestly, it is mindblowing. she also had that sex tape with ray j (aka brandy's brother), but it was so much more boring than it should have been, so i don't even really want to acknowledge it. in recent interviews, little kimmie (that's what i call her) has said that she is tired of people constantly making remarks about her ass, which is totally understandable.

SO WHY WOULD YOU GO ONTO THE SHITFEST KNOWN AS DANCING WITH THE STARS AND PERFORM TO "BABY GOT BACK?"

whatevz.

today i had an epiphany of sorts. while i was sitting in my backyard, enjoying the sunshine that was not accompanied by smothering humidity, i thought to myself, "this will probably be the only time for the rest of your life you can (kind of) afford to not have a job and live with your parents without seeming like a complete fucking loser."

because i'm fairly certain if this were happening to me at the age of 27, it would certainly be regarded as far more pathetic than it is now. and so upon making this realization, i decided that maybe i should not feel as bad about my current situation as i have been and be grateful that i even have the opportunity to live in my parent's house, which is so much nicer than any apartment befitting of my price range, for free.

it's totally fine that my life has not exactly exceeded my expectations thus far. i assure you, internet, when the stars align for me, and i figure out what to do with myself (in various capacities) it will be infinitely sweeter than if i had known right off the bat. i mean, i wouldn't want to peak too soon, anyway. that's boring.

so there.

ain't no tuition for having no ambition.

i am inexplicably completely exhausted. i passed out at eight thirty for about an hour and upon waking up i felt like i had been hit by a bus. i don't know why my body is trying to shut itself down as my day consisted of getting up at 11:30, eating pancakes, showering, putting on shorts that definitely fall under "loungewear," going to wal-mart with my brother to go school supply shopping (which was, incidentally, fairly draining mentally. it was so crowded and unorganized. and the list of supplies was quite elaborate, requiring far more materials than any sixth grader would ever actually use on a regular basis), and taking my dog for a walk. none of those activities really involve a lot of exertion, so why am i struggling so desperately to maintain consciousness?

in other news, i had yet another dream about the olsen twins last night, and i have been thinking extensively about how i can convince kanye west to let me carry one of his children. i had been thinking that i didn't want to mutilate my lady parts in that way for another decade or so, but if i could have his kid, i would be willing to move that date up significantly. i'm not saying i'm a gold digger, but that would be some pretty hefty child support, and i bet when you're pregnant with a famous rapper's baby, people aren't constantly asking you if you've finally found employment or a major you are willing to committ to.

that's what you get.

upon making myself a grilled cheese sandwhich, i went to the refrigerator intending to retrieve some complementary ranch dressing for my sandwhich, but after the actual action of opening the refrigerator door, i completely forgot what i was looking for. so i stood there gazing at the various chilled items and pondered out loud, "what am i looking for?"

at which point my father walked into the kitchen and jokingly said, "i don't know. but you're just standing there looking at the refrigerator, like in life. just standing there.. looking." he was definitely kidding, and i'm not even sure if he knows, but it's definitely kind of true.

laundry sucks.

for the past year i have hated doing laundry. i cannot recall this process bothering me before i moved to portland, so i assumed my newfound distaste was linked to the fact that in order to prevent all of my lighter-colored clothing from turning gray, i had to spend five dollars for two loads of washing and drying in my shady apartment complex's laundry facility. sometimes people would for some unknown, infuriating reason open my washer or dryer mid-cycle and then not restart it, severely inconveniencing me by delaying my finishing time. this, also, was a definite factor in my hatred of doing laundry.

now i live with my parents, where doing laundry is free, and i still despise it, so i now know that my disdain runs deeper than the pacfic tower laundry facilities. i have lived here for over six weeks and have done laundry one and a half times. (the half occured when i first arrived and was a tiny load, which is very much out of my laundry-hoarding character.) my cue for laundry is when i run out of underwear. i very much enjoy buying new underwear, so i have a lot of it. this allows the intervals between washings to be rather extensive. but today was the day i opened my underwear drawer and removed the last pair, so i am now forced to separate my large pile of clothing and fire up the washer and dryer once more.

not all of the attire i throw onto the pile of what becomes laundry is actually dirty. sometimes i pluck an item from its hanger, and then decide it's not what i want to cover my body with that day, so into the hamper it is tossed. or there are those rare times i wear something without spilling on myself like a fucking two-year-old, leaving it in perfectably acceptable condition to be worn again, yet when i disrobe for the evening, i wind up lazily throwing it in the general direction of my hamper.

so then, when the inevitable day comes when i run out of clean underwear, i must sort through the pile, smelling shirts and looking for visible stains in order to determine what is really in need of cleansing. and i think my hatred of laundry in actuality stems from this process.

i know what you're thinking, internet, "why don't you just put clean clothes back into your closet instead of misplacing them into the hamper?" i have thought about this too. i am trying to visualize myself doing this right now, and it just feels so unnatural. like i would lose so much time in my everyday life just sorting and hanging up clothes. sure, it might simplify the process on the day i run ouf clean underwear, but i would experience a small dose of the irritability i feel on laundry day on a daily basis. and i can't have every one of my precious days be affected in this way. i just can't. i am already emotionally fragile enough as it is.

oh, shit.

i have been fully awake for less than an hour and have already made two earth-shattering realizations.


1. the internet is killing my ability to read real books. i used to be able to read an entire book in one sitting. it was not a problem. i even enjoyed it. now i usually think about taking a nap after every three pages and have to coax myself into finishing chapters.

today i read two articles about how reading online affects literacy, and basically, reading online is better than not reading at all, but it doesn't compare to the deep, linear reading of a book and does no favors for the attention span.

overall, this is very depressing news to me. because i love the internet so fucking much. it has been a great source of comfort to me within the last few years, as my life continues to deviate from my expectations. but i also love the ability to read books in a timely manner.

this is such a dilemma. perhaps if i force myself to read books regularly for extended periods of time, i will regain my once natural reading ability, while still being able to waste away countless hours on the internet. yes, i think that will be my plan for now.


2. i am guessing it is highly probably for me to spend a very large portion of my adult life half-drunk, watching csi on dvd with my cat.

i fucking love babies.

i am not one of those crazy girls that has a very definite life plan that includes an age by which she wants to be married and how many children she wants to have of each gender with preselected names. in fact, i don't know if i ever want to be married, but i have decided within the last twenty minutes that i would really like to have a baby.

as a female, the idea of motherhood and carrying life should probably seem like the most natural thing in the world to me. it doesn't. when i imagine something living (or nonliving, for that matter) in my uterus for nine months, i am, simply put, genuinely creeped out. i've seen newborns. they don't even really look human. the idea of pushing one of those out of my body is sort of repulsive, actually. but new mothers always love their children, probably because they schlepped them around for so long that they are a) just thankful to not have it inside of them and b) you can't hate your own newborn baby, people will in turn hate you. and once they get a little older they become considerably more cute, kind of like kittens.

in the distant future, when i have my shit together mentally and fiscally and have found a fly, reliable fellow who matches or exceeds my level of coolness, i am going to proposition this fellow to create one of the top ten (at least!) coolest babies in the world. gwen stefani's spawn, kingston, ranks in at number one right now, just for reference. but my baby is probably going to blow that cute little shit out of the water.

how do i know my baby is going to be so fucking cool? i will tell you. i am a connoisseur of cute babies, and i can say without being biased, that i was off-the-charts adorable from my birth to approximately six years of age. (it definitely went downhill from there, but i think within the last year or two i've started to make a comeback.) i also happen to look exactly like my mother, who happens to look identical to her mother, which leads me to believe that my genetics will shine through in the making of this baby.

my partner in baby creation and i are going to make great parenting choices and our cool baby will not only be one adorable, well-dressed motherfucker, it will also be a baby that only cries for a damned good reason.

when it learns how to talk, i will record it singing along to top 40 hits and put these videos on youtube for others to partake in the awesomeness of my child. like the "my humps" baby, only even more incredible.

get it, gurl!

i have applied to 10-15 different places, and i only need one job. so you would assume that the odds are in my favor. but you would be sorely mistaken. because these kinds of logistics do not apply to the art of job hunting.

and while my life is still a toilet, at least things are looking up for one of my favorite crazies, second only to amy winehouse, britney spears.

here she is at an autism benefit:



do you see what is going on in that picture? she is standing next to two clean, sane-looking people, and she does not look out of place!

a vast improvement from this:

i'm a slut.

my family had dinner guests this evening. the couple that came over brought their son, who was seven or eight years old and seated next to me. he was not impressed by my mother's schnitzel, and the way he periodically panted made me believe he was definitely going to throw up on his plate. he didn't. but his behavior inspired the mothers to discuss the eating habits of their children, and the following dialogue occurred.

mom: "stephanie is easy. she always ate everything and still does."
dad: "stephanie, mom just said you were easy."
me: "well, you know what that means.."

(AWKWARD MOMENT, ALL AROUND.)

mom: "she's just like her dad."

why don't job applications fill themselves out, huh?

i wish someone i could just have a chance to tell employers how perfect of an employee i am.

my reasoning:

1. i'm poor and recognize that i am too unqualified to work jobs that make lots of money, so no matter how atrocious the job is, i will complete it out of sheer desperation for income.

2. i hate being reprimanded, which is my primary motivation for meeting expectations at work. i will never be late. i will never simply fail to show up for a shift, because i don't like it when people are made at me. also, i'm poor and need all of the hours i am given.

3. i hate being new at jobs so much, i would work at a job i completely detested simply to avoid having to find another one. so, no worries about me jumping ship shortly after time, energy and money have been wasted in order to train me.

oh, the south.

today i went to a columbus catfish game. the catfish play baseball. i kind of thought they sucked. my very limited understanding of baseball may have something to do with this. apparently they have been on a winning streak. the game itself was incredibly boring, but my fellow spectators were not. in fact, they were fascinating and caused me to raise several important questions.

the most pressing one being, "why do parents still give their children bowl cuts?" i just cannot grasp it. there was one child in particular that was totally fucking adorable, but his stupid bowl cut made me hate him. are these the kind of emotions parents want their kids to evoke in others? if i had to guess, i would settle with "no." bowl cuts ruin children.

while the bowl cuts were unsettling, the most disturbing hair belonged to another little boy. this child was sporting big, blonde curly hair that was tapered into a rat tail in the back. the effect could best be described as a coonskin cap (a la davy crockett) made of hair. i could not peal my eyes away from it.

until i looked a few rows down and saw a young man with a string of spitty mucus dangling an estimated six inches from his mouth. then he sucked it back up. it got even worse when some of it stuck to his chin. after some careful examination i realized this person was mentally challenged, at which point i was actually somewhat relieved. but even after i was able to rationalize the spit dangle, the remnants were still on his chin, and no matter how much i attempted to telepathically convince the men he was with to give him a tissue to wipe it off, they only paid attention to the game. eventually, the spitter noticed his face was still dripping and resorted to cleaning himself with his t-shirt. which, given the circumstances, was not such an awful decision.

i could eat my whole damn house.

i had a dream about the olsen twins last night. this is the second time i can remember this happening. i'm sure it's some kind of sign. probably that i am going to be a billionaire.

tomorrow i have to go to my new institution of higher learning to register for classes and shit. i am a fairly self-assured person, but i really can't think of anything that makes me feel more insecure than college. not because i don't think that i can handle it (because i'm obviously a genius, so that's never really been a problem), but i feel like there is so much pressure to choose a path for my future, and i'm just not ready for it... okay, society?

there are people who say to me, in an effort to provide support, "oh, it doesn't really matter what you major in. most employers will just appreciate the fact that you have a degree." this is not comforting in the least. because i want to have an education i can put to use, and i want my major and future career to have a correlation. i do not want to spend thousands of dollars earning a degree as an english lit major to become the manager of a home depot. i am looking for something with a little more meaning.

i wish that all i wanted in my life was to get married and pop out babies. it's not necessarily that these aspirations are any less admirable than seemingly more glorious goals. it's just that if my ambition was to lead a so-called simple life of marriage and children, at least i would know what i wanted and when i had achieved it.

a miraculous day.

today, my mother told me that my hair looked good. at first i thought she was being cruel as usual because my mother finds something to criticize about my appearance every single day, and my hair is a common target. Other frequent complaints are directed at my choice of attire and make-up (or lack thereof).

the greatest part of her compliment was that my hair looked exactly like it has every day for the last, oh, i don't know.. two months.

my family recently got two dogs, buckwild and woody. (my family is pure class, by the way.) i have never really had a dog before, and i can honestly say that i still love my ferocious cat, dewey, a thousand times more. the cuter, smaller of our dogs, woody, refuses to cuddle with anyone for more than three minutes unless you take advantage of him while he's sleeping. this always seems a little inappropriate, like date rape. sometimes when he's laying down, i like to lay next to him to stroke his velvety fur, and he will get up and walk ten feet away from me, only to lie down again. depending on how resilient i am feeling, i choose to follow him despite his blatant rejection of my love. i figure that i will eventually wear him down. he can't run forever.

i think i would prefer dogs if they purred. when i pet my cat, and he wants to say, "you are petting me, and i love you for it," he makes the most delightful purring sound. but when i'm petting of my dogs, even the one who lets me, i have no way of knowing if they are really appreciating my caresses.

better late than never.

i really wish that i had written about my journey across the country as it was happening, because i really feel that it was an experience i should have documented. i have a really shitty memory (thanks, chronic marijuana usage) so now many of the hilarious details have already left me. but i will attempt to recall as much as possible. or maybe i will just make things up because nobody will read this and after enough time i probably won't be able to distinguish the embelishments from the facts.

we left my grandparents' in cameron park, ca way too early in the morning. our first destination was salt lake city, which turned out to be something like a 12 hour drive. We had already been driving for several hours and were somewhere in nevada when my father purchased an up-to-date atlas. he found our location on a map and then started flipping many pages to look at a map of our destination. at the sight of all of this page flipping i grew extremely anxious and said, "oh god. can we really be that far away?" my father saw this as an opportunity to ridicule me since the maps of the states were in alphabetical order and the number of page flips did not correlate to distance in miles, just distance in the alphabet.

we finally got to salt lake city. we were staying in a hotel in the outskirts. we were hungry. we tried to find a restaurant. we settled on chili's, which turned out to be THE hippest place for mormons to be at six o'clock on a monday night. at one point i looked over at the table next to us to see a man clipping his fingernails. i am pretty sure that's some kind of health code violation. one of the hostesses looked exactly like this girl i went to high school with, which made me extremely uncomfortable. it was not her, but it was still weird. upon concluding our meal at chili's we decided to explore the mormon mecca and went to temple square.

most of the mormons i have met are very nice. this can likely be attributed to brain washing. so, we walk into temple square and are greeted by a young chinese woman who asks if we want to take a tour that starts in three minutes. my father and i agreed. the other tour guide was another young woman, and she was from hawaii. we stood around making small talk, telling each other where we from etc. then the chinese girl turned to my father and inquired about our relationship, asking, "you guys are... friends?" i do not know if child brides are common in the mormon church. i quickly responded with a disturbed, "no. he's my dad." which only made everyone feel more awkward.

the tour commenced. i'm not sure why i was not expecting this, but the tour was littered with information that clearly was meant to convert non-mormons into mormons. the two tour guides talked a little more about themselves, explaining that they were on a mission and would return to their homes when it was over, hopefully to find righteous men to get married to and start families with. i swear i am not making this up. and she definitely used the term "rightous men." while she said this she also gave a hopeful look to the ceiling, as if she was asking god to help her with this quest. i wonder how many times a day this happens. i cringed.

the next notable moment of the tour occured when we were able to visit a 12-foot jesus statue in room painted to look like the universe. they asked us to please be reverent as they played a narration about jesus. i wasn't really listening. but i did turn to my dad and ask, "is this creepy?" because sometimes i don't know if i just get uncomfortable in religious settings because i am on my way to hell or if they are genuinely unsettling. he also found it creepy. i concluded this section of the tour by taking a picture with jesus. i might frame it and hang it above my bed.

the rest of the tour was pretty boring. we went to the first ever mormon church, where the tour guides sang us a song and forced us to fill out notecards reviewing the tour. i didn't want to offend so i just said it was interesting and the girls were nice. it asked for my name and contact information which i was extremely reluctant to give. we then went back to our hotel and slept.

the following day's destination was colorado springs. to get there we had to drive through wyoming. nobody lives there. nobody. it also features the exact same landscape all along the interstate. at one point i got really excited because i thought i saw a bison, but my father informed me it was just a cow. such a bummer.

we had dinner at my dad's friends' house. they have had two children since the last time i saw them. their son kissed me twice, unexpectedly and uninvited. it would have been rather inappropriate had he not been six.

at our hotel room, my father and i discussed politics. we don't really agree on anything in that spectrum. i admitted my socialist leanings, and he looked at me with disappointment while telling me to hold on to my german citizenship. maybe i will.

the next stop on our great journey was fort riley, kansas. we were going to stay with some guy my dad met at his sergeant major's training and had served with in Iraq, but his family had some kind of function to attend, so we went over to some other family's house for a few hours. i am lucky my dad is so popular. we arrived at the other family's house before they were there. and as we were sitting on their front porch, hoping that we were, in fact, even sitting on the correct porch, i realized that i really had to poop. i also realized that it was rather windy. i asked my father if this part of kansas experienced tornadoes, and he told me he didn't know. i then commented that my car could use some rain to wash away all of the dead insect remnants that covered its front. i would later regret these comments.

my dad's friends finally arrived. i quickly entered their bathroom to move my bowels. while i was doing so i noticed that there were several different locks on the door. i found this strange. some more people arrived at the house and as we were all sitting around, we heard what seemed to be a siren. it did not sound promising. the tv was turned on to reveal that the area was under a tornado watch. i asked what this meant, exactly, and was told it just meant to be aware and if the siren went off again, we should probably go sit in the bunker, which was also the bathroom, which is why there were so many peculiar locks on the door. the siren sounded again, and i proceeded to piss my pants. not really. but i was shaking a lot. but that could have been because it was really cold in their house. i was definitely frightened. so, we all got in the bunker.

i think there was a total of eight humans, one golden retriever and a guinea pig. it was snug. we stayed there for about an hour or so, and then it passed. i am still amazed that on the one day of my life i happened to spend in kansas, the weather decided to cause a tornado to hit about a mile away from where i was staying. i was elated to leave kansas the next morning.

our drive to fort campell, kentucky was rather uneventful, as was our stay there. a major highlight was listening to the nelly/lynyrd skynyrd mash-up of "country grammar" the entire time we were in the vicinity of st. louis. this was obviously inspired by the fact that nelly utters the line "i'm from the lou and i'm proud." it was also awesome because the version of the song samples "sweet home alabama," our final destination. i find it very strange that my father enjoys nelly because any rap i ever want to listen to is not acceptable. but i will take what i can get.

then the next and final day of our travels was supposed to include a stop in Nashville, but after we got off the freeway and realized that the country music hall of fame would cost fifteen dollars per person to attend, we decided to just go home. this decison was also largely affected by the fact that my dad becomes easily outraged when driving in city traffic, and i do not enjoy all of the yelling. so we drove home to alabama instead, which was really just as well.