Dotty Parker

poor, poor genius

Poor Dotty. Look what she's missing out on. What a great opportunity.

Using "blogit" would make me thousands of dollars! Imagine what my subscription list would be like. So many people discovering my none-too-reliable schedule of writing; so many people curious about my dogs; so many people who currently don't take advantage of the possibility that they could pay me lots of money to read things that I rarely proofread.

Of course, this means that I'm supposed to read other people's blogs. I suppose with the idea of quid pro quo. But I mean really.

I vote that this is one of those things that sounds kind of tempting, but is, in fact, a great way to spend $5.95 a month to lose the right to exclusive use of your own material. Punks. And so, I vote no.

Yeah, I didn't mention, they'd have non-exclusive rights to all of your stuff. So you can still use your own stuff, but they can, too, and anywhere they want to. It seems to me that it isn't really your stuff anymore. Not really.

And I think what I'm really pissed off about is the spelling. Blog-it would be okay. Bloggit would be correct from a pronounciation standpoint. But Blogit. It would be said blow-git wouldn't it? And that just seems naughty. There's too much naughtiness on the internet already, yes?

Teach your children well. Grammar and spelling will one day cause them troubles, but keep from steering themselves down paths of badness.

man.

Today was the kind of day that everyone gets where they really want to get things done and they do get things done but it just isn't enough to have gotten things done they way that they did.

I had a vision/daydream today as I was walking around the house. I blame it on the dreams I had last night. I dreamt I was in a war and I saw very terrible things. I guess that's why it didn't bother me when, as I thought about what I felt like, it came to me.

I felt like I was running really fast trying to get things done but that I had big, huge moth wings on my back so I couldn't get through the door. At that point I was freaked out by myself. What would happen if the wings just snapped off? I don't know if I had arms. And how much does it suck that I can run so fast and fly with my new wings, but I can't get out the door?

It sucks a lot.

So to mitigate these thoughts and feelings, I have crafted a composite of my life in that moment.

And it looks interesting. From here, anyway.

x+y=genius!

I am a genius!

Not that there was any question before, but it is now confirmed. I took my GRE today and got super-cool scores.

How much of a genius am I? So much that I hide it really well. The woman administering the exam was giving me advice on finishing the test. She indicated that it was important to get as much done as possible. I think she felt like she had to explain things to me because I had a question about the contract-type thing we had to sign. It wanted me to agree that the name on the screen was mine. But I didn't have a screen yet! Apparently it didn't matter. But I don't think that impressed her much.

Then there was my concern with having tissues in case my allergies started behaving in an excited manner. After explaining that NOTHING was allowed in the testing room, I asked, "Even kleenex?" She said she'd supply that.

Oh and one of the questions had something to do with pancakes. I decided that I needed to use the word "waffle" to spice things up a bit. I told her about that and mentioned that I was very entertained by myself.

I can understand why I might seem a bit dim.

At the end of the exam the results of the multiple choice part are immediately available. I was so happy. I'm a genius, it's been proven, and I'm happy. But the test admin lady was prepared for me to be less than happy.

She asked, "Are you pleased with your scores?" I said, "Yeah! I got x..." insert very sad face from concerned GRE employee..."and y!" She thought my scores combined were x. But there was another variable that hadn't been accounted for.

I shall celebrate by bowling and drinking beer and wearing white socks and eating in a chain restaurant. I hope it has all kinds of junk on the walls. I'll feel like a real American applying to American graduate schools.

Oh yeah.

that is one crazy idea!

I've decided that craziness is a very funny thing. I have been a bit lazy in collecting stories for this page. I am writing only to inform that I have much to do in the way of story telling and that I shall get to it as soon as I feel like getting around to it.

It's always best to be honest, I think.

Erotica (to continue my theme)

This is a forward from Erotica. I can't say that I agree completely, but I can certainly rally around the kind of sentiments that might bring a person to the conclusions proposed.

(I can't think of anything original right now, so let's thank Erotica very much for her thought provoking contibution.)

Subject: Moral Question

This test only has one question, but it's a very important one.
Please don't answer it without giving it some serious thought. By giving an honest answer you will be able to test where you stand morally.

The test features an unlikely, completely fictional situation, where you will have to make a decision one way or the other. Remember that your answer needs to be honest, yet spontaneous. Please scroll down slowly and consider each line as this is important for the test to work accurately.

You're in Florida...In Miami, to be exact.

There is great chaos going on around you, caused by a hurricane and severe floods ...... There are huge masses of water all over you.... You are a CNN photographer and you are in the middle of this great disaster. The situation is nearly hopeless.

You're trying to shoot very impressive photos.

There are houses and people floating around you, disappearing into the water.
Nature is showing all its destroying power and is ripping everything away with it. Suddenly you see a man in the water, he is fighting for his life, trying not to be taken away by the masses of water and mud.

You move closer.

Somehow the man looks familiar.

Suddenly you know who it is - it's George W. Bush!

At the same time you notice that the raging waters are about to take him away...forever.

You have two options. You can save him or you can take the best photo of your life.

So you can save the life of George W. Bush, or you can shoot a Pulitzer prize winning photo. A unique photo displaying t he death of one of the world's most powerful men.

And here's the question: (Please give an honest answer)

Would you select color film, or go with the simplicity of classic black and white ?

maintaining the theme

I've been writing about sex-related or wood-related (ha ha ha ha) stuff.

And today as I was putting away groceries I saw, "Family Size" written on one package and "Value Size" written on another.

I was amused. I thought, "How does one determine whether a family size is a value? I know for certain that all value sizes are not for families. And not all values are for families. Family values takes on another meaning..."

Then I started thinking about switching packaging. There isn't anything I can think of right now that would be warped if the advertising said "Value Size" instead of "Family Size."

Changing it the other way around would cause problems.

Things that have been named "Value Size" that would NOT benefit from being "Family Size":

Condoms
Razor blades
Bottles of wine
Lawn chemicals
Boxes of nails
Ammunition
Cartons of cigarettes
Dog food
Laxatives
Nasal spray

There are lots more, but I risk being redundant or obtuse. Lord knows I'm already obtuse enough.

I've got a value pack of obtuse.

so many reasons

Given the nature of my last entry, I feared BrilliantEditor would send me away and tell me that I'm much too, um, spicy for his liking. I also decided not to allow comments on it because I thought I'd get spammed, and because I thought he might make his terrifying pronouncement public.

And then it happened.

I found a catalog of his that suggested to me that he is much less of a prude than I'd anticipated. I would like to list some of the entries for you. Perhaps you could guess what kind of catalog this is.

"The Son of Skew" with Alan Lacer
Hamlet Miniature Set
"Little Brother"
"Eccentric Chuck"
Taper Mate
Sorby Probe
"The Goliath" with optional curved shank
Black Velour Box
Brushed Satin Kits
Dick Sing Books
Custom Necklaces
Inlace Metal Dust
Vinyl Gloves
"Pink Ivory"
Non Woven Hand Pads
Red Oil Wand
Bonnie Klein Videos
"In My Grave" Tee Shirts

Do you know what these listings came from? Can you guess? Should I make you tune in next week?

No. But it would make me happy to know what your guess was. Do tell, please. I will be most contented.

Here's the catalog

the pink pussycat problem

Are you familiar with the new kind of Tupperware party? It has nothing to do with Tupperware, but it does have to do with the format. I'm sure you've heard of the candle parties and the Pampered Chef parties and who knows what all, but this one, my dears, is a category requiring its own category.

The sex toy party.

Yes indeed. A whole bunch of people, in my experience women, sit around sipping wine and holding tiny plates delicately on their knees. You might expect that the plates would have food on them.

You would expect wrong.

In fact, the tiny plates contain smidgens and droplets of massage oils, body paints, body butter, sweetened sprinkly dust, and a few things I'm sure I'm forgetting.

While all the tasting is happening, the woman who brings the paraphenalia to the host's home begins showing, in an astonishing array of colors, textures, sizes, capabilities, electrification options, materials, the false phalli.

These are sci-fi creations. Some looked to me like a combination of a lava lamp and a strand of DNA. One, which still haunts me, was full of gently colored pearls. The pearl-filled shaft, when turned on, so to speak, bent slightly and turned so the pearls clicked against each other and underwent the circus ride from outer space.

Why does that one haunt me? It sounds kind of pretty in the abstract. Lava lamps, pearls, soft clicking--like meditation, really.

But here's the thing. I'm not sure if it was the same one, but in my mind they've become one. It had two different switches. One was on and off. I expected that. What I didn't expect was the second switch. That was the one for the voices.

Hearing voices, you say? Why yes! As the pearls undulated and swirled, you could flip a switch and a voice would say, "Oooooooo, oh yeah, mmm, oooooooh." That kind of thing. A woman would say that. If you pushed the switch one more click, a man would say it.

Haunting me. I hadn't realized how far my biases reach. I hadn't realized how much sex toy designers considered the interchangeablility of toy use.

How clever to put both voices on! Any woman, any man could purchase the item and hear the vocalizations of his or her choice.

So egalitarian.

I was telling a friend of mine about it after we'd been invited to such a party. She started laughing a little and said, "What if you switched with the answering machine?"

And I started cackling thinking about some woman beginning to wonder if the man inside her answering machine had taken up residence between her legs. "Why is he always asking me to leave my name and number? They never call, anyway."

Then imagine her mother calling. "Uh, Hon? It's your mother? Are you home? Is this your number? What are you doing? Who is that with you? Will you call me, please? Hon?"

shhh! d'you smell something?

There's a moment in the Ghostbusters movie in which Dan Ackroyd's character, Ray Stantz, is in the basement of the New York Public Library. There's ectplasmic goo dripping from everything and he stops, puts his arm out to stop Bill Murray's character, Peter Venkman, and says with, much conviction and urgency, "Shh! Do you smell something?"

I think it's funny as it is, but today I was petting Spring while she was lying on her back. She was looking at me most of the time, but when there was a sound down the hall, she rolled her eyes way, way back, as if to say, "Get out of the way. I can't tell if I hear something."

I suppose it's natural to turn toward something you hear. Is it natural, though, to not turn your head and just roll your eyes? Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, she says, if I move you won't pet me, but if I don't move I won't see what I hear. Ohhhhhhhhhhhh. So sad.

I guess it must be natural, though. I do it, too. Sometimes, when I'm in bed and warm and sleepy, which is as happiness inducing as being petted must be, I can roll my eyes all over the place without turning my head to "see" if I "hear" anything.

It's still weird.

ouch! pin!

I went to my friend's house today to help her take in her jeans. She's lost weight and has decided, although she is proud of her new, lean physique, to keep her pants on when she's walking around.

I tried to be gentle and careful when I was pinning as I didn't want to stick her with pins. Nevertheless, however, I did. She only said, "ouch" once, but she told me that I'd poked her with the tip of more than one or two pins.

Strange things, pins. When you're actually sewing you want them to be straight and thin and extremely sharp. When you're using them next to someone's body, there's a desire to have them be curved and a little more hefty so they don't bend out of shape and to be slightly less sharp so you don't have a pincushion as a friend.

Ah well. She was a good sport. She even gave me some lemonade to drink. Yea!

wanna get physical

Do you remember that Olivia Newton John song "Let's Get Physical"? It's going through my head right now, surely a punishment for a crime committed long ago. In gym class in seventh grade we had to do a dance to it. It involved pretending to dig things up while rocking in a circle. It was not my finest moment.

I went to do the pancake breakfast this morning, round up the volunteers and such. When I sat down to eat, I was alone and I sat at an empty table. Another fellow came over to sit at the table and we ate silently for some time. I can't remember how he started the conversation, but it quickly moved to his participation in the TOPS program.

TOPS stands for Taking Off Pounds Sensibly. I will admit to a bit of sensitivity when it comes to talking about taking off or putting on pounds. I admit to further sensitivity when I'm eating. Nevertheless, this fellow was very kind and wants everyone to love the program as much as he does. He lost 23 pounds. His wife lost 16. He says it's easier for men to lose weight than for women.

I picked up a pamphlet on my way home. I think it's underneath the leftover cake I brought home from my friend's house where we had dinner tonight. Do I have to mention the irony there?

Yeah, I didn't think so either.

enough!

Okay. I declare all sickness in this whole wide world to be over. There you are. Cured.

Here is how I got my neck mostly cured. I am the dog.

BellyRub and Erotica are coming into town tonight. I probably will not see them until tomorrow, but I'm all excited and happy and giggly and my tummy is twizzling around with happiness at seeing those two wacky kids.

I miss them both so much. I must confess that I can put my missing of BellyRub into words more easily than I can for Erotica. Erotica and I have more of a girl-type bond. It's the kind that defies description, really, and so it's often best to leave things at that.

BellyRub called today and we chitchatted for a while. He was at work. I got put on speaker phone so I could broadcast my mellifluous voice throughout the office. TentativelyTitledTallTimidGirl, who works with BellyRub, mentioned that it was a bit strange to hear my voice when she only reads my voice.

I suppose that would be weird. Like reading a book and then meetiing the characters in real life. They never, or almost never, look the same as my mental image.

Sweet 4TG also mentioned that I wasn't sounding terribly chipper. I'm not so unchipper, though, so I'm going with middle chipper-ness. We'll see how we go.

I shall now move on to making some pictures and setting up my ftp junk so I can share them with you, my darlinggs.

La la la.

photo montage

I'm disappointed in myself. I've not been interesting at all. Not at all.

BrilliantEditor listened to me beweeping my lack of creativity and suggested that I do a photo collage in the manner I've done before. I think it's a good idea. But what to do? And what pictures?

Usually I go through the files of pictures I've earmarked as strange or funny. They've been in the files so long that they don't seem strange, though.

And I just remembered, I'm too lazy to set up my ftp thing. So maybe I'll do that and then I'll put up pictures and then I'll be amusing and then I won't be ashamed of myself and then, and then, and then, and then.

Oh yes.

returning to normal

At long last, I can turn my head. Yeehaw! I'm not all better, but I'm so much better than I was that I'm very close to better and thus being not better isn't really an issue.

I do believe that I have nothing to write about. I've been working, still working, on my graduate school applications and recommendations and things. I fear that every error will give them a thousand more reasons to toss my application in the trash. I suppose if they're that tough I might not want to go there anyway. I've said that before, though, and I still want to go.

The dogs are not excited about my going. They believe it is my responsibility to stay at home with them and provide them with pork products. Perhaps they caused the misspelling.

Punks.

pain in the neck migrates to ass

I have often thought that a life of even more leisure and ease than I currently possess might be fabulous. Unfortunately, I was wrong.

I've been stuck moving very little, unable to turn my head. What a pain in the ass. Leisure, I suppose. Fabulous? I vote no.

I went to the doctor today who gave me some drugs. She also checked to see if I was having a stroke, a heart attack, or any of a number of nuerological difficulties.

My reflexes are extra good, though. My legs kick the air like nobody's business. It's almost embarassing to me that they flap around so much. Nevertheless, I am able to kick ass in my sleep.

pain in the neck

I think I'm a bit of a tightly wound person. I try to be all cool and stuff, but I'm not really cool. I'm worried about the rotation of the earth, revolutions in China, new leaves turning over, spinning wheels, stomachs doing somersaults, people flipping out.

This thing has happened before. I mysteriously develop a tight muscle in my neck that resists aspirin, dry heat, moist heat, smelly patches of menthol, stinky rubs of camphor, menthol, and peppery compounds. The time it was really serious was when I was in college. I drove home from school, an eleven hour trip, and was happy to go to sleep. When I woke up, I couldn't move my neck.

I walked downstairs to tell my mom that my neck hurt and I could't move it, but when I got there, I fainted because it hurt quite a bit. Yes, once again we note evidence for my nomination into the delicate flower society.

This is when it's handy to have a Dr.Dad. You can call him and he calls Dr.OrthopedicSurgeon who prescibes a muscle relaxant that makes you very sleepy. When you wake up you aren't cured, but your head moves again and you're very thankful. You sure are.

I'm thinking about calling Dr.Dad tomorrow if I'm not feeling fit as a fiddle. Whenever I get this neck thing, I'm pretty sure it's the tightly wound trait coming on a little strong. I become convinced that I'll paralyze myself if I move too much. I think Dr.Dad will get thrown in jail for asking for inappropriate medications. I don't want to go to sleep because I want to make sure it works. I feel like I need to hold my hand on it so that it everything stays in one place.

I'd lose my head if it weren't attached. Oh yes, I just might do that.

poofy puppy power

BellyRub and I were talking on the phone a few days ago and he told me the story of getting the dogs groomed. He has a bichon frise and a toy poodle. These are fuzzy dogs with many ringlet curls all over their bodies.

I wrote to BellyRub to send me the story of what happened, since it made me laugh to imagine what these creatures looked like when he picked them up. It also makes me laugh to think of Erotica taking these doofus groomers to task for their foolishness.

Here's the story as told by BellyRub:

OK, So we make the appointment to get the doggies clipped and they say, "You
can drop the dogs off at 7:00am." No problem. Erotica has to get up a little
earlier but it's no big deal. I called the night before to get directions to the
place and be sure someone will be there. The woman tells me that there is a
vet conference and we cannot drop them off until 8:00. Wonderful, I have to
be to work at 7:30 and Erotica at 8:15.

Not good. we're already missing time from work.

Erotica is sick anyway and stays home, so she drops off the dogs. She gets a call at around 2:00. They say that Tessa is fine, but, "Charley decided to move when I was cutting his paws and I accidentally sliced his pad. The vet thinks he needs a couple of stitches. We will have to sedate him. Is that ok?"

What the hell do you say to that?

So he gets the stitches.

I go in to pick him up after work and the woman that groomed him says he is still a little groggy. She gets him from the back, and I pay very little attention
to the hair cut because of the iridescent green bandage encasing his left
back leg. Tessa is fine, looking at the pig snouts in the bin by the wall. It's Tessa and there's food...of course she's fine. As I walk out the door with the two pups, I pick Charley up and I say, "Oh! you didn't cut his tail."

She says, "Your wife said to leave it."

Well ok, stranger things have happened. "That does not sound like her," I say and leave.

Charley is sitting in the passenger seat looking at me. "What happened to my
foot and how come my tail is a 3 inch sphere?" he asks and licks his chops.

Erotica had told them to leave his goatee. Instead, the groomer had cut it off and left a cone/wedge design using the hair on his cheeks and top of his head.

He's licked his mouth enough that he's matted the hair around his mouth down. Now he had one of the nicest sets of mutton chops I had ever seen on human or animal; what a ridiculous looking dog.

Erotica has since cleaned him up, but he has a few stray hairs as a reminder.
He goes back to the vet Tuesday. Erotica took him back to the vet the next day, though, to say that she wanted her money back. She said that the haircut was unsatisfactory and not what she asked for. She specifically pointed out the bizarre spherical tail.

The woman behind the counter said, "He didn't look like that when he left here yesterday."

Having had just about enough, Erotica nearly screamed, "Do you think I glued his hair back on?!"

They didn't refund our money, but they are giving the dogs a free visit to the vet for their vaccines.

------------

Dotty suggests never going back to that groomer/veterinarian. Take the free vaccinations and run.

a weary world

The world is full of jokes, commentary, worry, and general exhaustion when it comes to discussions about sex. I, as a child, used to wonder how that could be. Such a fascinating, mysterious, mystical realm, it seemed. Who could tire of talking about it? What commentary could be unwelcome?

Oh, but let me share with you my new discovery. I know it's new to few others in this big world already weary of sex-talk, but to me, receiving unsolicited comments on this blog is just shockingly odd.

I must explain that I don't want to have my penis enlarged. It would first necessitate the acquisition of one and then the decision that the model I had chosen was inadequate for my needs. Perhaps I should allow for the possibility that I have made poor choices in my life, that I wish I had purchased a larger car for example, or made better use of my bookshelf. Choosing a new body part size, however, seems to me better discussed with a doctor than an internet person who sells some kind of medication that will induce neurofibromatosis or elephantiasis (also called lymphatic philariasis, caused by parasitic worms. Maybe that's what you get in that bottle of capsules.), prosthetic device, or attachment.

So that's that for the parasitic penis enlargement as far as my penis is concerned.

Then there are the drug advertisements. Try this one! It's the best one there is! We aren't telling you what it does, but it's the best!

Annoying. Irritating. And even more annoying since I already take one of the ones being advertised in my comments. Bastards. They put up an ad for oloft-zay, a drug that is supposed to send those sad, bluesy, irritable feelings skipping down the road. Well, my darlings, this taker of oloft-zay is full of ire and would dearly love to kick someone right in the pants.

Generally, I wouldn't be so irritated by this. These are par for the course, I suppose. Who knows, I may have mentioned them myself at some point. But I got five of these in one day. Two of them for "fissing pantasies". What?!

I'll probably get a thousand of them now that I have those two key words in there, but I'm hoping to avoid it by changing the letters around. And using pig Latin. I'm really ticked off about the whole damned thing. Hate it. But I'm glad I'm bi-lingual.

Pig Latin hasn't ever served me so well.

here we go round the mulberry bush

I have two new friends. I'm so excited. We get to go out to dinner together and go to the mall together and watch movies together and talk about boys together. It's so fabulously fabulous.

I saw one friend today, I will think of names for them, and she's been having boy trouble. Her heart was broken in a bajillion pieces last year and she's trying out datiing people, but good golly Miss Molly, she surely can pick those crazy situations that surely need to be written down somewhere.

So I, being a girl, gave her some useless advice.

I said, "First, stop dating boys and go out with men. If you have to buy them alcohol, there's going to be a maturity issue, isn't there?"

Then I said, "Second, consider being a lesbian.

"It would probably take you a while to get used to the idea, during which time you might be able to sort out what you'd want in a partner, man or woman. By the time you figure out that being a lesbian just won't work for you, you might be ready to find someone who will join you in the holy sacrament of matrimony.

"Or you might have the self knowledge and confidence to get some quick booty and not feel guilty about it."

That was my advice. I think it was damned good advice, if not useful.

Still, I warn you all, man and woman, that she's looking for someone, she's beautiful, she has really great shoes and hand bags to match, she makes me laugh. I want to put her picture here and a little bio so people can see if she's their dream girl.

I don't think she'd appreciate that, though. I'll update you with her thoughts on it.