Tag Archives: sarcastic bitches rock

Jan Brewer: The New Face for the Fight Against Glossophobia

Jan Brewer.

We all came to know Jan Brewer, the current Governor of the State of Arizona when on the fateful day of April 23, 2010, against (and perhaps delighted in?) the rising controversy and media scrutiny, she signed the “Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act” (aka Arizona SK 1070), setting the record for Arizona as the state with the most encompassing and strictest anti-illegal immigration laws, effectively bringing the country back 100 years.

Little did we know that Governor Brewer, under the facade of mean-spiritedness, tough-shit, insensitivity and fuck-political-correctness a la Sue Sylvester in Glee, actually struggles with her own disability. She is a sufferer of glossophobia.

The New Spokesperson for Glossophobia raising awareness to this horrible horrible condition

Glossophobia is NOT the fear of gloss, as some of you may have thought. It actually means Fear of Public Speaking. Or in layman’s term, speech anxiety.

I used to despise her too. But no more. Have you seen the video of her at the televised gubernatorial election debate when she was caught all of a sudden by her glossophobia? ? She stared at her prepared speech for more than ten seconds, lost for words. I assume that the extremely awkward gap of silence was not caused by her not having prepared for this debate especially since this happened during her opening statement when she was introducing herself and summarizing the wonderful things she has done for her state. In fact, I assume that she must have practiced and practiced and practiced. But when you suffer from speech anxiety, you have no idea when it is going to catch up with you. Just like that. Snap. She blanked out.

When Rachel Maddow played the same clip on her show, she besought her audience to go against our humane tendency to avert our eyes when a proverbial train wreck is happening, to put in suspension our discomfort in witnessing our fellow human being’s moments of embarrassment. It is painful to watch, as Maddow said, but watch it you must otherwise how would you understand what a horrible condition glossophobia can be? The pain. The humiliation. The suffering.

It was very painful for me to sit through those 40 seconds. I wanted to turn my head. That awful gap of silence that must have felt like a lifetime.

Tick tock tick tock. Oh fuck. My mind is blank. Say something. Make something up. Fill it with whatever. Think on your feet. Ad lib. Improvise!

As an actress, going blank on stage was my worst nightmare. As a mouse in the corporate maze, public speaking is my biggest fear.

People have asked me whether it is not ironic that the thought of speaking in public sends me straight to panicville when I have stood in front of a full theatre wearing nothing but a bustier and underwear. To me, there is a natural explanation: when I was on stage, I was someone else, saying someone else’s lines, living someone else’s life, all according to the script. It was actually safe.

Public speaking is a whole different beast. A much scarier one. Thinking on my feet? Making it up as I go along? Ad libbing? No not I. Improv? Not in this life.

This is why I have been content in my lot in life: Can’t speak in public? Well, let’s cross out all these things then as potential career choice… It was a long list to cross out. And I am pretty sure running for public office was one of them!

After I stopped shivering from witnessing that painful episode and recovered from my shock, three light bulbs immediately appeared over my head, like so:

Light Bulb #1: OMG. Jan Brewer is a victim! I cannot believe we have been so mean to her!

Hath not a glossophobic eyes? Hath not a glossophobic hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions; fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons? If you prick us, do we not bleed?

I cannot believe that I, a fellow victim of this condition, have been so callous as to think that there is something wrong with her. NO! Jan Brewer deserves our sympathy. I for one empathize with her.

Light Bulb #2: WTF? So you can run for public office and even be elected a state governor when you cannot finish a brief self-introduction without quivering and looking pitiful? AND you can also make grammatical errors when you are reading from a prepared speech? I feel CHEATED! I have been lied to! Where is that piece of paper where I crossed off potential career choices due to my “condition”?

Light Bulb #3: Thank you, Jan Brewer. You have inspired all the glossophobics to reach for the star! So what if we tend to blank out during our public appearances? We will no longer fear the sound of the crickets! Down with the crickets! We can still run for public offices and hope that we are brilliant enough to fabricate scare tactics such as “headless bodies popping up all over Arizona borders because of illegal aliens” and to manipulate people’s fear and frustration towards the economy into votes!

CODA: Unfortunately right after I finished the draft for this post, Jan Brewer’s behavior made me question her commitment to the Glossophobia Awareness Movement. In fact, I doubt that she suffered from this condition at all!

After what I thought was her “coming out as a glossophobic” party at the debate, she went on the Sean Hannity show, managed to completely sidestep her performance (or lack of) at the debate and told everybody that Obama and “the federal government is after Arizona and they are going after everybody.” Ok…

Then I noticed it. The nasal voice. She sounded as if she had the worst nasal congestion the world had ever seen. I became breathless just listening to her. I kept on taking bigger and bigger breath because I was afraid I was going to stop breathing the way she was going to stop breathing. (Yes, I am an empathetic listener…)

Perhaps because of her severe nasal congestion, she’s got a lot of loogy, snot, boogie way up there? Or maybe it is the other way around? Man. I feel bad for her.

Or maybe it is all her. You know: *Jazz hands* Just Jan. *Jazz hands*

I mean, after all, with a maiden name like DRINKWINE*… Well… You know…

* Nope. Not kidding. Yup. It really is Drinkwine. Can’t make this shit up.

How to Talk to People (Now with Visual Aids)

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“7 magical conversational phrases”

I came across this article the other day on Match.com. (Eh. Don’t ask WHY I was on Match.com… That hot sexy blonde whose picture is winking at ya? Yup. That’s my profile: I used a picture I took of A Vapid Blonde… Now you know. People LIE about these things…)

It immediately caught my attention. I sure could use some help in social situations, and these are promised to be “magical”!

Smart phrase #1: “Tell me more about it”

Smart phrase #2: “What are the reasons for your opinion?”

Smart phrase #3: “I never thought of it that way”

Smart phrase #4: “That must have upset you”

Smart phrase #5: “How did it go?”

Smart phrase #6: “You are a really generous person”

Smart phrase #7: “I really admire that” or “That takes courage. I admire that.”

As I read through the article, without much snickering, I became worried about the possibility that when the needs arise, I may not remember these 7 magical spells under duress. I remembered the days when I was trying to educate my kids the art of correctly using the alphabet: Yes. Flash cards work wonders, and visualization is the key to the mythical depth of human memory vault.

Here are the 7 visualizations to help me, and now you too, memorize these 7 magical conversational phrases and be the life of the party next time you are caught in one of those social occasions.

You are welcome.

Magical Phrase #1: Tell me more about it!

Magical Phrase #2: What are the reasons for your opinion?

Magical Phrase #3: I never thought of it that way

Magical Phrase #4: That must have upset you!

Magical Phrase #5: How did it go?

Magical Phrase #6: You are a really generous person

Magical Phrase #7: I really admire that. I do!

WTF Wednesday: Blast from the Past

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I recently remembered that I have kept my computer files from the last century somewhere on the hard drive and went looking. I came upon a Letter to Nobody that I wrote in 1997 documenting an interesting encounter that I have since forgotten.

What surprises and delights me is that I sounded just as sarcastic, bitchy and “stabby” thirteen years ago. I have not changed one bit!

Yet another excuse for me to use my favorite sign from The Bloggess

Another just as delightful realization dawned on me: A letter to nobody yet with an imagined audience somewhere out there? An innate, almost pathological need to (over) share, to tell my stories? I guess I am destined to be a blogger all along. Or perhaps it’s the other way around: I should be grateful that blogging came along and saved me from a life in the joint from having stabbed someone. It was bound to happen if not for this.

My Stories
June 25, 1997

As you all know, I have had several “interesting” experiences as an Asian woman in this country. But tonight I hit the jackpot. . . I thought I might share it with you all. I hope you “appreciate” this story as I do.

I went to Brookstone in the mall with my husband this evening. We were looking at different things and I wandered away from him. (My first mistake?) I was looking at a finger blood pressure measurement machine when the salesperson sneaked up from behind.

“I see, you are taking your own blood pressure,” he said.

I wasn’t interested in the gadget, so I didn’t respond to him.

“Do you not understand English? Are you with the man over there?” he said loudly and slowly.

So before he even heard me speak, he assumed that I did not understand English.

“Oh, man, I can’t believe this is happening.” I thought.

I tried to give him a good comeback. So I took a deep breath, sighed, without looking at him,

“No, I do NOT understand English.”

He laughed. Ha ha.

Now, most normal human beings would just take the hint and leave me alone, but not my salesperson. He continued,

“Oh, you do NOT understand English VERY WELL. Not only do you understand me fine, you also got the joke.”

I was wondering which part of his remarks could be the joke. I was also frustrated because he did not get MY “joke”.

“Are you looking at the electric toothbrush also?”

He took down one of the electric toothbrushes displayed on top of the blood pressure taker I was looking at and started explaining how the thing works. Again, I wasn’t really interested.

“Are you not understanding me? Do you understand enough English? Are you following me here?” he out of nowhere drew this conclusion about me.

I asked myself, “Is it because how I look? Is it because how I dress?”

I have to admit that he caught me offguard. I couldn’t believe that someone would say something like this out right to me. I was so surprised that I forgot to get offended.

Silence.

He kept on saying something else. I wasn’t listening. I was laughing. I turned to him with a smile,

“You know, right now I really feel like grabbing something and hitting you with it.”

I ended my line with more laughter.

“I’d better leave here now,” I said, not moving.

At this moment, my husband approached us and asked me what happened.

“Oh, I was just being too helpful and she said she wants to hit me with something,” the salesperson said with a laugh.

Then he turned to me and said, “I know how you feel.”

Do you really? I was thinking.

“I feel the same way whenever I go shopping,” he added.

So isn’t that curious? He feels like an Asian when he goes shopping!

WTF Wednesday: A great week to be a misanthrope

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I am having a hard time with this post: I cannot decide which WTF moment to lead with. Too many blazing instances of human stupidity, greed and bigotry circulating the Interweb and I am at a loss. But forge on I must since if I don’t write a WTF Wednesday post this week, it would be like Tiger Woods missing the opportunity to play his 18 holes after being appointed the chaperon for the Miss America Pageant.

WTF Moment #0: BP Oil Spill. ‘Nuff said.

WTF Moment #1: BP’s liability is, as of now, limited to $75 million due to a law passed 20 years ago.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kk4n0SvG0-Y

WTF Moment #2: BP made $5 billion in profits in the last quarter. That’s PROFITS, peeps, not REVENUE. And it is last QUARTER, not last YEAR.

WTF Moment #3: BP CEO said they will take responsibility for the RESPONSE but NOT the Accident. Since the drilling platform was outsourced to another, much smaller company, BP is, as implied by Tony Hayward, not at fault. In the same vein, DOD is not responsible for what happened in Iraq since much of that has been outsourced to Blackwater, and I am not responsible for my children since much of their education has been outsourced to the public school education system.

WTF Moment #4: Soon after the explosion and the resulting spill, BP reps went around coastal communities, offering residents, including fishermen whose livelihood depends sorely on the ocean, Wait for it! A whopping $5000 if they agreed to not sue. Please see #2.

WTF Moment #5: Is it just me? Was anybody else disgusted by BP’s move to create an environmental friendly, greener, image with their new green sunburst logo? They spent millions of dollars on that rebranding campaign. It would be tragically ironical if they end up paying LESS in liability for the largest environmental disaster to ever happen to this country than what they have paid in that marketing campaign.

WTF Moment #6: “Rush Limbaugh suggests environmentalists planned oil spill.” Please say something to this while my jaw is on the floor and I cannot talk.

Earth to Rush: Hey! This is Glenn Beck. I don’t believe that Obama blew up the oil rig!

WTF Moment #7: If you are shocked by #6, you are going to love this… According to Rush, “The ocean will take care of this on its own if it was left alone and was left out there.” And, there’s more!

“It’s natural. It’s as natural as the ocean water is.”

My favorite comeback came from Keith Olbermann: “You know what else is natural, according to Rush? Hemorrhoids.” GOLD!

WTF Moment #8: (This is personal whining…) We have planned a mini vacation to St. Pete Beach, Florida, this week specifically just so we could revisit Fort De Soto Park, one of the best beaches, and most under-hyped, in the US. It’s not just me saying it, it was selected as America’s Best Beach in 2005 by Dr. Beach. From what I have read so far, there is a chance that these beaches will luck out and escape the tragic fate of being affected by the oil spill. At least for now. But some scientists are not as optimistic and have predicted a not-so-sunny future for the Florida coasts, and ergo, economy. Upon learning this, I am becoming grateful that, by coincidence, this may be the last time we have a chance to see the beaches in their pristine, gorgeous state before the looming disaster hits.

WTF Moment #9: Another disaster was not receiving the deserved attention due to the oil spill and other shenanigans (that will be reported later in this post): the flooding in Tennessee and Kentucky which has reportedly claimed 29 lives and put more than 1,000 people in emergency shelters.

WTF Moment #10: The bomb used in the Time Square Bomb Scare was made with no more than items found in random hardware stores or beauty supply shops based on instructions found easily on the Internet. New York Times published a lengthy article describing the contraption, complete with a shopping list for any wannabe copycat out there. But of course, nobody in this country would be crazy enough to want to copy this. So we are good.

WTF Moment #11: The Time Square Bomber “suspect” Faisal Shahzad had been put on the “Do Not Fly” list but still managed to board the Emirates flight. Authorities are blaming Emirates Airlines for working with an outdated Do-Not-Fly list.

WTF Moment #12: Arizona. Where should I begin? Ugh.

On April 23, 2010, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed a bill that enacted the toughest and most stringent immigration law this country has ever seen in modern days. You know, after the Immigration Act of 1924 which included the National Origins Act and Asian Exclusion Act and most of what’s covered in the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 were abolished by the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. So yeah, we effectively walked backwards 45 years…

This law would make it a crime for immigrants to fail to carry immigration documents on them and give the police the authority to detain anyone they suspect to be in the country illegally.

Note to Self: When in Arizona, remember to NOT dressed like an FOB. And of course, to remember to carry my U.S. passport with me at all times.

WTF Moment #13: Arizona. I cannot even make this shit up. According to The Wall Street Journal, “The Arizona Department of Education recently began telling school districts that teachers whose spoken English it deems to be heavily accented or ungrammatical must be removed from classes for students still learning English.”

Ok. I agree that teachers without a command of correct grammars should not be teaching English. But how many people you know that are native English speakers ignore grammars when they speak? How often do you see native English speakers with higher education commit the “sudden death” (imo) mistake of using IT’S when they meant ITS?

And how about those accents sported by other native “English” speakers from the other parts of the world? The Irish. The Scottish. The Australian. Hack, I have a hard time understanding the British accent.

Here’s my proposal: Anybody that does not speak AMERICAN should not be allowed to teach in our schools. Period.

Oh. You say you don’t know how to define “the American accent”? You say you cannot understand the Bayou accent even though it is technically VERY AMERICAN?

Well. Fuck me.

I wish Arizona have simply come clean from the beginning and said what they have had on their mind all along, “Whose spoken English it deems to be heavily accented or ungrammatical and WHO HAPPENED TO BE BROWN.”

You know what? I am pretty darn sure they have no problem with Elin nee Nordegren Woods’ accent even if she sounded like the Swedish Chef.

WTF Moment #14: Arizone. Again. Triple win. Seriously. Give the other states a chance. South Carolina called. They are not too happy with the spotlight you have been getting lately. They want their hard-earned “Worst State” title awarded by Jon Stewart back!

The attack on ethnic studies.

According to a proposed bill, school will lose state funding if they have classes that “promote the overthrow of the U.S. government, promote resentment of a particular race or class of people, are designed primarily for students of a particular ethnic group or advocate ethnic solidarity instead of the treatment of pupils as individuals.”

Have you read the Classic English Literature Canon used in English 101? Leaf through it and let me know when you come across an author whose works have been included in Classic Lit that is was (well, according to the DEAD White male rule, they are all dead so the past tense is a given) NOT white. Go on. I’ll wait.

Oh. What? You cannot find any. So one could argue that Classic English Lit canon can be construed as “designed primarily for students of a particular ethnic group”?

I guess I shouldn’t have behaved like an ungrateful immigrant. We really should be grateful that within the proposed bill, the teaching of the Holocaust or other cases of genocide will still be allowed. Oh my god. This is huge. Thank you so much! Until some closeted Holocaust denier becomes the next superintendent, that is. So teach them while you still can, teachers!

WTF Wednesday: Letter to Congressman

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Now that healthcare reform bill has been signed into law, and we are NOT holding our breath to see when changes can really be carried out, probably years, and by then, I’d probably be dead from holding my breath especially since I can in all honesty hold my breath for only 10 seconds under normal circumstances… It’s amazing I know for someone with such a loud mouth and loud voice, my lung capacity is pathetically puny… what with the lawsuits filed by several states, the continual protests from the GOP and the Tea ~~Don’t-Call-Me-Baggers~~ Party members, something else on the horizon for the Republicans to wage a new battle:

The ~~proposed~~ VAT.

Actually, it was not even proposed in the congress. People started ASKING QUESTIONS about VAT because economist, former Federal Reserve Chairman, current White House advisor, Paul Volcker on April 6 answered a question at a New York Historical Society event, saying that VAT is not as toxic an idea as people may think. Oh, he also said, “If at the end of the day we need to raise taxes, we should raise taxes.”

Ooops. They (The Dems) did it again! Sound the alarm!

I have been trying to read upon various opinion pieces to draw my own conclusion. But the fact is: NOBODY has officially proposed it yet except John McCain, the Maverick. He alone proposed an anti-VAT amendment preemptively. Like anybody else I would like to be able to keep as much of my hard-earned money as possible. I was surprised therefore by my annoyance when I received an email from my Congressman, taking a survey, with a simple question: “Should Congress impose a new VAT tax?”

With NO information whatsoever on the background and origin of the recent brouhaha over VAT.

Most likely I simply needed a good dose of rage to distract me from life itself. Nothing, NOTHING, gives a good slap to wake me up from my self-pitying stupor like a good invitation for raging psychotic foaming. I immediately saw this email, perhaps wrongly, as an incendiary, biased missive disguised as an innocent, neutral survey. A fear monger. So I fired off this email, perhaps a bit pigheadedly. It felt good, I have to admit. I don’t really care that he will not read it.

Dear Congressman Kirk,

I feel the email survey on the proposed VAT you have sent out via email is misleading, if not disingenuous. When you send out an email with a brief question “The Congress decided to add more tax. Do you think they should levy more tax?” I am going to take a wild guess that most of the respondents will say “H to the ELL NO WAY!” I am going to take another wild guess that you and your staff will then show the survey results, perhaps even call a news conference, with the “stunning” result of the majority surveyed having chosen “NO”.

If a doctor goes to a patient and says, “Would you like to have toxic chemicals injected into your body, with the potential risk of killing the cells in your bone marrow, losing all your hair, and in general feeling weak and like cr*p all the time?” I am going to take a wild guess that the patient is going to say, “NO.” But if the doctor provides the patient with the facts and the reasons behind his/her recommendation, the patient will be empowered to make an informed decision.

Yes. You can argue that people who want more information can always go online. After all, google is just one click away. But let’s be honest with ourselves: The topic of TAXES has always been extremely personal to people especially those who are blessed enough to be in the high-income bracket, and lately it has been turned into an emotional subject as well. in your wildest guess, what will be the % of the people who after receiving this email wondered about the facts behind the VAT proposal instead of getting some gut / visceral reactions to the short question you posted?

Frankly I am disappointed. For the very least you could have included a link in your email to a fact-based, neutral information page. Granted very low % of the recipients are expected to bother to click on that link, but to those who care to learn more and to make their decisions based on facts and not based on a base human desire for self-preservation and an all-too-human “They can eat cake” mentality, such a skin-deep effort on your part would have helped prevent this bad taste in my mouth I am experiencing.

Sincerely,

I only bring up my degree when I write complain letters...

How I relax

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Visual Representation of My Thought Process

To all the people watching, I can never thank you enough for your kindness to me, and I’ll think about it for the rest of my life. All I ask of you is one thing: Please do not be cynical. I hate cynicism: it’s my least favorite quality, and it doesn’t lead anywhere. Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you’re kind, amazing things will happen.

– Conan O’Brien

p.s. The picture is from our vacation in Maui in 2008. It was warm. No snow. I was on vacation. No work. My job was secure then. No impending doom. And my kids were still just kids. No freaksoid preteen (Such a category is not even named in Chinese so how do you expect me to deal with this phase?!).

p.p.s. Great. The picture was supposed to help me relax. Now it simply reminds me of things that once were.

p.p.p.s. If I were given $32 million dollars, I could probably also afford to be un-cynical.

p.p.p.p.s. Ok. That sounded VERY cynical.

p.p.p.p.p.s. Sorry. Coco.

The strength of not giving a damn

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We have all been asked of this quiz question before:

What Super Power do you wish you had?

I still don’t know what my answer should be.

Flying?

Mind control?

Teleporting?

“The ability to eat as much as I want without gaining any weight”. Yeah. That’s what I am thinking right at this moment.

You all know The Bloggess. She of the power of turning everything into a hilarious nature. Really. We should send her to the frontline, protected inside an armor car of course, and give her a microphone. She has the Super Power of turning people into a howling, thigh-slapping, LMAOROTF, Dionysian mass. And believe me: I normally do not like touching my own thighs. Except one thigh would always inadvertently touching the other, but that cannot be helped. I sometimes would get mind-clarifying, “Come to Jesus” moments when I read her blog. It ain’t all fluff.

A line I heard from the video embedded in one of her posts still haunts me till this day:

“I have the intellectual confidence to appear stupid sometimes.”

THIS, is one of the best quotes I have learned in my whole life. Now, please repeat it with me:

“I have the intellectual confidence to appear stupid sometimes.”

I believe, by internalizing this line, we can all be liberated from self-consciousness and self-censorship. I believe this will be especially helpful for women climbing the corporate ladder, especially if the work place is predominantly male.

At first I thought that men are so good at “chiming in” and “making their points” at any meeting because they somehow were privy to this secret. Nah. Based on my years of ethnographic study of the male species in the corporate jungle, I believe that they are so good at “speaking up” because, unlike women who are often self-reflexive, most men never even consider the possibility that what comes out of their mouth may just be flat out the stupidest thing someone has ever heard of. See, they never apologize before they speak. The strength of not giving a damn. THAT is the Super Power I would like to have.

Today’s BOGO special:

In addition to the quote above that can serve as an awesomely witty throw-away remark when someone suggests that you are intelligence-challenged, AFTER you sucker punch them of course, here is another motto for you to use in your role as Truth Seeker:

We are entitled to our own opinions; we’re not entitled to our own facts. — Al Franken

I Comment Therefore I Am: The Amazon Edition

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Unknown Mami Here is another edition of I Comment Therefore I Am, following the footsteps of the great Unknown Mammi.

In this era of information overload, in a lot of the news blogs, especially political news blogs, comments are often the best part. Sometimes the scariest part. The comment section is like a looking glass through which you get a glimpse into what the other end of the spectrum is really thinking, under the cloak of anonymity. Wouldn’t you know that comments are also the best part in product review websites?

Amazon.com.

Bet you did not know the fun you would encounter by prowling the world’s largest retail store. Here is one that has become a legend, a pop culture reference:

Three Wolf Moon Short Sleeve Tee: BEST comments? You bet'ya!

As of now, there are 1,657 customer reviews of this shirt. WHAT? Yup.

In November 2008, one genius shopper, or social commentator, wrote a smashing, rave review of this shirt, which has since garnered 222 comments. More than that, 17,617 of 17,783 people found the review helpful. Sheer number counts make this review a force to be reckoned with. The popularity of the review and the number of imitators propelled this shirt to some Geek Stardom. Case in point: The final episode of The Office when Pam and Jim got hitched? Dwight was wearing this shirt when he proudly declared that he would be at the bar to pick up the ladies.

The review is funny as hell. Read on:

“This item has wolves on it which makes it intrinsically sweet and worth 5 stars by itself, but once I tried it on, that’s when the magic happened. After checking to ensure that the shirt would properly cover my girth, I walked from my trailer to Wal-mart with the shirt on and was immediately approached by women. The women knew from the wolves on my shirt that I, like a wolf, am a mysterious loner who knows how to ‘howl at the moon’ from time to time (if you catch my drift!). The women that approached me wanted to know if I would be their boyfriend and/or give them money for something they called mehth. I told them no, because they didn’t have enough teeth, and frankly a man with a wolf-shirt shouldn’t settle for the first thing that comes to him…” (Continue reading)

Satirical, rave reviews are often done to highlight the ridiculousness of the high price asked for the product. For this $500 audio cable, Denon AKDL1 Dedicated Link Cable, dueling reviews have been written: Yes! It solved Global Warming! and No! It caused alien invasion!

I know. Some people have way too much time on their hands. Speaking of people with too much time AND money on their hands… SOMEONE alerted me to this Land Cruiser for sale. At $19,999.95 it is a steal, won’t you say? But the reviews are priceless.

JL421 Badonkadonk Land Cruiser/Tank: I think this is an ACTUAL product and not meant to be a joke...

You know how I love making a point when given the chance, therefore when I saw how much the baby bath book is fetching…

If this is not a WTF moment, I don't know what is...

I had some fun…

Product reviews as a new form of satire. What has the world come to? Guilty as charged...

New Year’s Resolutions? Bah Humbug!

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I don’t understand why people complain about the frenzy over Christmas yet fail to be annoyed by the hype around New year’s Day. Ok, yeah, I understand why. But I am taking some “poetic license” here…

It is probably just me: No will power. No desire to improve myself. Disillusioned by year after year of failed plan to exercise and diet three days into the new year. Cynical of the belief about New Year = New Beginning. It was just another same old clock ticking. Arbitrary!

I woke up on January 1, 2010 to yell at the kids for yelling at each other on New Year’s Day.

“IS THIS HOW YOU WANT TO SPEND THE FIRST DAY OF THE NEW YEAR?”

I know. My 2010 has already started with a big irony. I can see that this is going to be a great year.

Perhaps it was a wrong move for me to step on the scale at all this morning… Everything just went downhill after that…

I have learned, rather than set myself up to fail, to set individual, realistic goals for each day: Today I vow to do the dishes, wash the bedsheets, finish unpacking, put away the stuff on the floor and vacuum the carpet. Not sure about making the bed with the laundered sheets. That can probably wait until January 2nd.

Years ago when Mr. Monk was still a toddler and I was a happy content definitely NOT-restless SAHM, I learned a few things from some online cleaning guru lady that still apply to this day. It makes the times when I switch my role to that of a housewife “a life full of purpose”:

1. When you wake up, get dressed, and put on a pair of sneakers even if you are not going anywhere. Sneakers help transform all the household chores into “exercise-like” items. You will feel yourself more energetic, and more purposeful. They also keep your feet from getting tired: you know you have a lot to do around the house!

2. Wear an apron with pockets when you pick up the house: you can stash the knick knacks along the way in the pockets and put them back where they belong on route.

3. Put on some music and move to the beat. My favorite is ABBA’s album, starting with Dancing Queen.*

4. My own tip: Have a drink. Add more rum.

Have a wonderful New Year’s Day, Soren Lorensen!

* Our friends FORMER friends put both Dancing and YMCA on the DO NOT PLAY list at their wedding. And those two songs only. I knew then that this friendship would not last… Turns out she belongs to a fundamentalist church and does not believe in dinosaurs. ’nuff said. (The real kicker is? He is a biologist. After so many years, I still wonder how that has worked out for them?)

WTF Wednesday: Fighting “I Guess I’m a Racist” with “I Guess I’m a Lazy Ass”!

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UPDATE (12-17-2009):

I realized that my attempt at satire actually makes it even more confusing. My apology. I will lay it out straight: The “I’m a Racist” ad is ridiculous also because it predicted on the faulty assumption #1 HCR is mostly about the African Americans #2 Ergo I have been accused of being a racist because I am against HCR. OR, if you criticize my criticism of HCR, you are accusing me of being a racist. In my mind, #1 is incorrect, and therefore #2 is incorrect. (This is the argument I was trying to make by invoking the fact that there are also a lot of POOR WHITES who are trapped in the poverty cycle AND the arguments, on both sides, seem to have overlooked their plights).

The new ad “I Guss I’m A Lazy Ass” I am proposing here is for the Pro-HCR camp as a comeback. And it is satirical. Hard to convey “satirical” tone with words since you can’t see my Quote Fingers or Jazz Hands… It plays upon #1. The assumption by many in the anti-HCR camp (anti-Public-option) that people without health care are lazy asses who cannot hold a job, etc. Why should we help those people out? #2. This proposed ad would confront that assumption. #3. The prominent representation of white people (a la the prominent representation by the final Black guy in the “I’m a racist” ad), as sarcastically proposed, refers to the common assumption that Poor White People are Poor NOT because they are lazy but because they are unfortunate…

Anyway, it serves me right to be smug enough to think that I can tackle such a controversial and complex issue. This is such a charged subject and as you can see I am confused myself. There is probably no need for this update either since you either got me (for which I am very grateful and would you please come to my house and explain me to my husband?) or you have moved on to more important things (I would have done this if I were you too so no hard feelings), but I feel that I need to clarify things because I am anal retentive. The bottom line is:

I would like to see the government TRYING to help the truly unfortunate out, esp. the millions of children that are not ensured, and if that means I have to pay more taxes, I am fine with it. Will they make some bumbling mistakes along the way? You bet ya. But the expectation of imperfection should not be the excuse for not doing it at all. Have all the countries claiming to be a democracy really adhere to the democratic principles all the time? Are there not corruptions, nepotisms, all sorts of Jackassery going on? You bet ya. Does that mean democracy failed and we should just write it off? I am sure the answer is no.

This I believe:

“No one should die because they cannot afford health care, and nobody should go broke because they get sick.”

The Original Post (as published on 12-16-2009):

Many of you have this feature called Wordless Wednesday every, eh, Wednesday. But me? Not talking? When I have my own soap box right here? Ha. Therefore I decided to start my own tradition called WTF Wednesday.

And conveniently, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, together: what do we have here?!

My token male reader called me out on an evasive post last week, half-assedly commenting on the “I guess I’m a Racist” anti-healthcare reform ad.

Yeah yeah I know I just also wrote this big giant navel-gazing post about how I am going to ignore all of you and just do whatever I want. So I am going to ignore you right now for mocking me…

Although I have blogged about how I feel about HCR, his comment struck a cord. I was caught red-handed for not following through with my oh-so-big announcement of how I am going to just go ahead and be myself. YOU GOT ME DICK! (No, he really is a dick. I mean, that’s what his blog is called. Eh, never mind…)

So here it is, a week later, assuming (hoping, actually) that I am preaching to the choir, FWIW:

The video is asinine to say the least. As Professor Melissa Harris-Lacewell succinctly puts it, “THIS sucks the rhetoric air out of the room.”

First of all, the ads (and many comments circulating on the Interweb) unquestionably assume that RACISM operates on the individual level, rather than on the institutional level. Regarding institutionalized racism: You either agree with this, or you don’t. This is my pessimistic conclusion.

Furthermore, the ads (and the subsequent celebratory comments around the Interweb) wrongfully, yet effectively, turned the entire HCR debate around and recast the issue in an ultra emotional light, since most people do not deliberately practice racist beliefs and activities, and most people take it very personally, understandably, when they feel they are being accused of being a racist.

The real issue of HCR, in my opinion, is one about class: the Have’s vs. The Have-Not’s. And we need to recognize that in the U.S., the class issues are inextricably linked to race issues, due to our unique histories. Although many in the African American academia have challenged the “code words” used in the HCR debate, e.g. “Welfare Queens”, “under class”, etc., it does not mean that they are trying to “hijack” the HCR issue with race issues. The poor Whites will also benefit from an improved health care system. And do you know approximately 2/3 of all welfare benefits administered by the government went to poor Whites? Why is that in a discussion on HCR that could benefit all the people who currently do not have any form of health insurance across the board, we don’t hear about these non-non-White folks’ plights?

Somebody should make a video with all sorts of people speaking to the camera, “I guess I am a lazy ass,” to move the dial all the way to the other end: “You cannot afford health insurance, it must be your own damn fault!” Preferably featuring WHITE PEOPLE since as the thinking goes (as exemplified in the “I Guess I’m a Racist” vid) :
BLACKS <> NOT RACISTS : WHITES <> NOT LAZY ASS
Ergo, all these people that you saw just now? NOT Lazy Ass.

And definitely remember to show a mother with an innocent child who looks at her mother and asks, “Am I a lazy ass, mom?” That’s going to be some powerful shit.

I would have suggested Asian Americans in the vid to make the strongest point because of the whole “Model Minority” stereotype — You know: We work hard. We pull ourselves up by the bootstraps. We are good workers. We hunker down and keep our goddamn mouths shut. We never complain. Yada yada yada — were it not for the other stereotype of Asian Americans being immigrants and foreigners. THAT would have served the enemy’s purpose: LOOK. The HCR IS going to provide insurance to foreigners. OMG!

Some random lady “engaged” me on a debate on Twitter. Imagine debating someone on such a complex issue 140 characters at a time?!… Her argument comes down to: I have done my part. Why should I give more? The government should get out of the business of trying to tell ME how I should spend my (husband’s) hard-earned money. AND, this sort of sums up her position: “I pay tax because I HAVE TO. I give money to charity, through my church, already.” At that point, I said, “Do you seriously want to engage in a political debate with someone who was just talking about tits on Twitter?”

That was the moment when I became deeply convinced that there is NO way we are going to change each other’s mind. None.

That was the moment when I fell in love all over again with Jon Stewart.

p.s. Comedy Central’s blog post on this vid is called “I Guess I’m a Racist, Sexist, Puppy-Killing Psychopath Who Never Calls My Mom“… The title IS the comment.

p.p.s. The funniest, most scathing, most intelligently sarcastic, and in my mind, the most effective comeback was found on The AWL:

“I’m of the opinion that it’s always great to see an oppressed group of people attempt to reclaim a word that has been used in the past to cause hurt and shame. I’m thrilled for Republicans that they’re trying to take the ‘racist’ label back.”

GOLD.

The Absence of Alternatives

My therapy sessions…