'Supposibly'
Mood:  on fire
Now Playing: OutKast
I have to admit, although it pains me to do so, I have become my mother and boy, is my sister laughing! I have become what I swore I never would--a grammar Nazi (even though I come by it honestly as my mother and grandmother could have edited William Strunk Jr.'s book "The Elements of Style" and probably found it gravely lacking).

To this day, my mom and grandmother constantly correct me when I speak. When I was a kid, there were times when the vein on my forehead would throb incessantly and my head would pound as I was trying to tell a story in which every third word was corrected by the two of them throughout the retelling (and mind you, you had to repeat the correction back before you could continue). It was like having a multiple personality disorder with that many voices clamoring in my head.

My grandmother was the worst. She just wouldn't let things go. She was like the rat terrier of grammar. The worst part was when I was using slang and she would correct me and correct me over and over, ad naseum (I may have a bad slang habit, but I can still sprinkle my verbiage with those impressive Latin phrases). The one thing I learned NEVER to say in front of grams: "We're going together".

I know that you know what "going together" means. It means that I liked some little dork boy and we were hanging out together with our newly found hormones racing, writing stupid quiz notes that we passed back-in-forth in class, ceaselessly walking by each other's lockers in the hopes of glimpsing each other between classes--you remember. It did not mean dating as in 8th grade it wasn't really dating now was it? Gram's standard response was: "Where are you going?" and I would explain "No grams, we're going together" and she would say "But where are you going". She just couldn't let it go much like my sister's Jack Russell, Stella, after she hunts down a prairie vole.

I was a verbally traumatized kid and it was all about sentence structure, proper conjugation, verb/noun tenses, and the proper use of adverbial clauses and prepositional phrases. Flash forward to adulthood. What am I guilty of? I am a card carrying member of the grammar police. What annoys me almost more than anything? Poor grammar and mispronounced words. The word that sends me over the edge? 'Supposibly'. What is up with that? I hear it everywhere! Newscasters say it, it's used in advertisements and sprinkled in conversations. 'Supposibly' is scattered about more than laxatives in a sorority house!

Let me just 'spill' the 411 on 'supposibly' for you--IT'S NOT A WORD FOLKS! I guess there are just tons of people out there who are nimrods (I already thought this, but this definitely confirms it). I think the word they believe they are using is SUPPOSEDLY. Supposedly as in allegedly.

Here is a simple test to perform to see if you are using the pseudo word 'supposibly'. Take the adverb supposedly and remove the -ly and you have the adjective supposed. Repeat with me: "The supposed criminal". Yep-that sounds right-the alleged criminal. Now do the same with 'supposibly':"The 'supposib' criminal"...what the hell does that mean? Nothing!

Won't you help me to take a stand against the insane butchering of the English language? Just say "NO" to 'supposibly'!

Maybe
Mood:  irritated
Now Playing: Pink Floyd-A Momentary Lapse of Reason
Maybe. Have you ever really given much thought to the word maybe before? Me either. It's a complete cop-out word for sure. It gives you the option to follow through or to give up or to just not reveal your hand in the poker game of life...but it also keeps the lane of possibilities traffic-free because you aren't committing one way or another to anything much like a lane jockey on the feeway.

By definition, maybe means `by chance' or perhaps. For example "maybe he'll call tomorrow". Personally, I think that the majority of the time maybe means "no". Even all-American surfer turned musician Jack Johnson says so in his song "Flake"..."It seems to me that maybe pretty much always means no..."

Think about it. When someone tells you maybe in response to your question, whatever it may be, more than 9 times out of 10 it will end up as no. Some people will argue that it means "I don't know" but that only flies when there is one excuse attached to it like "Maybe I can help you with your bikini wax this weekend but I may need to flea dip my dog" as opposed to "Maybe I can help you with your bikini wax this weekend if I don't have to take my dead grandmother to the doctors, build a suspension bridge over the Amazon or finish my master's dissertation on the molecular composition of bratwurst."

So why does everyone always use it? Is it our inability as a culture to feel comfortable enough to come right out and say no or is it more the fear of hurting someone's feelings? I don't know. I just know that I would rather hear "no" than "maybe" or even worse...the dreaded "definite maybe" `cuz as we all know, there is nothing definite about maybe...

What idiot let you on the road?
Mood:  on fire
Now Playing: Dork Country Favorites Mix
Do you ever wonder if some --oh hell, I'll just say it-- a large portion of our fellow drivers took a double toke on a crack pipe before venturing onto the local highways and byways?

I am a patient person (just ask anyone who knows my ex husband), but I swear there are days when I just don't seem to have enough middle fingers to deal with it all. I constantly find myself wondering if I am the only person, in what basically amounts to a 1-ton or greater mobile weapon of death and destruction, who knows how to operate a turn signal or understands the three second rule. (I bet you are asking yourself now what that is...)

I have realized that many of the driver stereotypes are solidly grounded in reality. Apparently most women drive like they have sex--with little imagination or attention to the act itself. The majority of men who drive giant pick up trucks are indeed compensating for being hung like Dachshunds. Those people with the Jesus fish all drive like total idiots--apparently they feel the big "JC" has them covered. Then, there are the minivan drivers who suffer from the delusion that their vehicles have no accelerators. The worst though are the old people. If all you can see of the driver ahead of you is a set of bird claws clamped in a death grip on the steering wheel of a land yacht, you are behind a 3' 5" rapidly shrinking senior citizen who thinks he/she is off to play canasta at the local Moose Lodge in Coral Gables...never mind the fact that in reality, he/she is tooling around Arizona.

While some people on the road piss me off more than others, I am starting to understand road rage in a way I never thought I would. I also am coming to a greater understanding on a daily basis of why I should probably not buy a handgun and if I do, why I should NEVER, EVER allow it to enter my vehicle...unless I have an excellent criminal defense attorney and a wad of bail money available.

Just what is it with some men?
Mood:  don't ask
Now Playing: A mix of AFI
My friend Dawn met a guy on eHarmony. We?ll call him ?Ivan'. She was thrilled as ?Ivan? was making it clear that he was Mr. Wonderful in search of true love and a happy ending and he thought she was the one for him. The reality was that although ?Ivan? talked the talk?he sure as hell didn?t walk it. Apparently he mistook eHarmony for Swingers.com?

He was all into her?the pursuit was on! Torrid and intense emails are zipping back-n-forth between them like Internet Red Rover. The phone conversations were filled with flowery prose, tingly nether regions and Vulcan mind melds. Oh the promises of eternal bliss he made? ?I'm drawn to you, I want to pull you close to me...to feel your body against mine...and to make love to you...to connect deeply with you?to fall asleep with you and wake up with you?to focus completely on you and I.? This goes on and on as she is pulled further and further in like a Marlin caught during a sport fishing contest off the coast of Mexico.

Then, when he felt he had reeled her in, he dropped the atomic bomb?or at the very least, hydrogen, when he said:

?I can't promise fidelity. I so much want to... but I've looked deeply at myself... and I can't promise you something that I can't promise myself.?

Head snap. Huh? What? What happened to ?I want to focus completely on you and I?? When would that be exactly? When you?re not wildly traversing every street in tuna town like a drunken sailor on shore leave?

See ?Ivan? fancies himself a player. I can?t conceive of how as the man who describes himself as ?very good looking? and ?height-weight proportionate? has apparently not gazed upon his countenance in a clean mirror recently and is somehow harkening back to a 6th grade school photo (or perhaps a random hallucinogenic vision) where he actually has hair on his head (not just meandering up his neck like a school of anchovies who have lost their way to the ocean) and doesn?t have a fat apron around his waist that threatens to black out the country of Denmark.

I think we can all agree that there is nothing quite as nauseating or pathetic as an aging wanna be free love boy of the sixties trying to live out a lothario lifestyle when, quite frankly, he ain?t got the goods to carry it off (unless you count telling everyone ad nauseum how much money you make and how brilliant you are).

Apparently though, if you attempt to charm enough women with smarmy lines you will eventually find one who is emotionally delicate enough for you to conquer. It?s a numbers game folks. It?s not dissimilar to the loser who asks every woman in the bar to go home with him. Eventually, the odds will momentarily swing in his favor as he has asked 100 women and one was finally drunk enough to say yes. He?s thrilled. WAHOO!!! I?m a stud! He doesn?t care that the chick will wake up the next morning and be desperate enough to pull a ?coyote? to get out of there (you know, when a coyote is trapped it will chew its own limb off to escape) ?cuz he finally scored and it is all about him!

Men like ?Ivan? HATE when they encounter a woman like Dawn?strong and intelligent-- and mistake her for an easily dominated ?girl?. When they do, watch out ?cuz BAM! (to quote Emeril) they will go from Prince Trying to Charm Your Pants Off to crabby bitter boy faster than a beer bong being swilled down at a frat party.

It must be an acrimonious pill to swallow when some mere ?girl? out maneuvers your tired old reasoning and catch phrases. I don?t know about you, but the red flags fly in my mind when a man refers to the principles of Archimedes and Newton while defending his position on monogamy and fidelity (or a complete lack thereof) within a relationship. (I tend to reference Feyerabend and Epictetus myself?)

I think what I take away from this third-person encounter with ?Ivan? is that I find it an amusing, albeit sad, testament to our society. Women obsess over every grey hair, new wrinkle and sagging bit of flesh while most men seem to be completely oblivious of their true physical appearance. I think it calls for a new reality t.v. show??You are nowhere near as hot as you seem to think you are!? I?ll call Hollywood and suggest ?Ivan? as their first guest?

What is it about nuns anyway?
Mood:  quizzical
Now Playing: The Best of Yes
I never realized how many people have "nun phobia". It seems to rank right up there with the fear of clowns, snakes, and Oprah...

My ex-father in law had an overwhelming fear of nuns. Well, not all nuns, just one nun in particular. Sister Mary Claude. To this day, he cannot speak of her without pouring a stiff 3 finger scotch. I find this amusing as he is an older and distinguished circuit court judge in Michigan. Apparently, it doesn't matter how old or successful you get, a bad experience with a nun can haunt you for years.

So what power do nuns hold over those accursed folks who spent their young educational lives being force fed catechism? Is it the fact that nuns look like overgrown vampire bats? Or that we consider all women who dress in black sacks and act asexual to be suspect? (Unless it's a burqua and then we just pity your existence). Is it because everyone knows that Sally Field and the whole sweet and loving flying nun concept was just Hollywood propaganda?

I ran across something disturbing about nuns just the other day. Apparently an "ex" nun has written a book of love poems that the Synergistic Press describes as "lusty"...does that just make parts of your anatomy pucker or what?! She credits writer William Blake with "wresting her from the convent..." Well, I guess it could be worse...she could credit Robert Blake...

So what is it about nuns that can hold people in such a grip of fear? Personally, I have no idea. I'm a Methodist. We don't have nuns. We just like to drink wine and sing...hence why I like the religion. It's kind of like summer camp but without the fire or the roasted wieners...

Say it isn't so!
Mood:  sad
Now Playing: Etta James singing the songs of Billie Holiday
My favorite blog, other than my own neophyte and amateurish attempt at one, is the infamous "Rance" blog at: http://captainhoof.tripod.com/blog/.

If you have never checked Rance out--look at it as you would a one day 50% off sale at Nordies and light a fire under your ass to go check it out! Apparently, much like Elvis, Rance's rage to keep blogging has left the building.

If you are unfamiliar with Rance here's the deal: Depending on what day it is, Rance claims to be a bitter A-list Hollywood star or some loser who overdoses on Access Hollywood in his grandmother's basement. Some claim he is John Cusak. My girlfriend Deb swears he is George Clooney or Matt Damon. Some say he isn't really even alive. Maybe, just maybe, he is the ghost of Elvis being channeled by that John Edwards guy of Crossing Over `fame'. Who knows. Do I want to know who he is? No. Do I care? No. I find his blog amusing, droll and insightful. Much more interesting than the vanilla blah, blah, blah I hear daily at my office. But then again, I am easily amused so I could be overrating it as I also find the monthly newsletter from tshirthell.com to be hilarious to the point of tears. I was told once that I could probably be left alone in a room with a bowl of hard candy and amuse my self for hours...true story. (But is that necessarily a bad thing I ask?)

So what does it all mean? It means that I will have nowhere to go day after day for my three minutes of titillation...I better find myself a cabana boy.

In Search of a Liver...or Speaking of My Trip to Minnesota...
Mood:  party time!
Now Playing: Ry Cooder
Now, having been there, I wonder how anyone in Minnesota ever gets anything done. From what I observed -strike that- observed sounds too much like Marlon Perkins on Wild Kingdom. From what I saw while there, everyone seems to be in a continuous stage of drinking and usually in their garage.

Once again, I must put forth that I think this is a regional thing (the garage part). During my visit, I thought Clan Erickson was just `odd' until I was driven around the neighborhood on the two buck tour and saw numerous families partying and BBQing in their garage.

One would think that there would be that nagging little carbon monoxide inhalation problem with grilling in an enclosed space, but apparently the generations of mutants that have evolved from this practice breathe through their gills or something...but I digress.

In four days, I consumed more liquor than I have in the 14 years since I graduated college. Seriously. I went to bed Friday night/Saturday morning at 4:30 am (A happenstance as I apparently missed the tag-team action that went on mere feet away from my drunken slumbering minutes later. Apparently in Minnesota, no house warming party is complete without a threesome blessing your basement) and awoke at 10:30am with the bonus buzz (AKA still drunk). This went on for a matter of days. I couldn't figure out why I hadn't been hung over, but then I realized, I had yet to be sober.

Upon my return to Arizona and some semblance of sobriety, I logged immediately on to eBay in search of a new liver...to no avail. What's up with that? I thought you could find anything from a Filipino house boy with knee pads to performance fleece on eBay...

Fried Food on a Stick...or the Regional Cooking of Minnesota
Mood:  incredulous
Now Playing: Sound Track from Tank Girl
The regional food of Minnesota (otherwise known as fair grub) consists primarily of things that I had no idea could be fried (e.g., Snickers bars), food on a stick, or a combination of the two. Now don't get me wrong. There is something to be said about food on a stick. I can see the marketing campaign for it now..."It's fun. It's convenient. It's portable. It's food on a stick."

Now I am a firm believer that more meat should be offered on sticks. It takes out that problem of appearing like Henry the VIII (8th for those not well versed in Roman numerals) or a gremlin when sucking down an Atkins-style snack. However, when you start venturing into the realm of "pickle on a stick" you are just getting frigging lazy!

I do find it amazing though that a state where the consumption of beer per capita is more than anywhere else in the United States...ok, not more than Wisconsin, but close, would encourage the promotion of food on a stick. I mean, it's all fun and food on a stick until someone loses an eye...