Um...What??

I'm Blogging About Blogging Again...In The Hopes I Can Distract You From The Fact I'm Not Actually Doing Any REAL Blogging

Friday night I decided to try out a little design change on this blog.

Let's check in with two of our most loyal readers to see what they think of it:

Chris (later that same night while visiting/commenting on previous post): WHA? ME DRUNKY ALMOSS. BUH JUSS ALMOSS. Bog differ? Nooooozzzzzzz.......(THUMP)*

Mom (the next morning on phone after logging on here): It's different?

Why. Do. I. Bother.

* Okay. This is less part of an actual conversation Chris and I had and more a composite of an e-mail he sent me, the comment he left on my last post and the fact that while doing so he didn't notice the blog was different. This is called creative license.

To be fair, the new banner image you now see at the top wasn't there yet. (You: What new banner image? Me: Slightly more dead on the inside.) And in case you were wondering, yes I drew that porcupine in exactly the same way I drew that donkey a while back. Only this time around I actually paid good money for the right to use it and by that I mean it cost me fourteen dollars which is good because any more than that and I might not be eating this week. I haven't decided yet if using the porcupine illustration is really clever or tragically stupid, but obviously the second would probably be more ideal considering the blog that it's on, and it's not like I actually need to explain this to any of you. Unless, of course, you're new here, in which case I can only apologize and assure you it's not going to get any better.

But there was a different new banner there that looked like this:

This was a part of the new, pre-defined theme I chose (more examples of themes in a moment and yes, this is exactly as exciting as it sounds if not more so), and while I liked everything else about the overall design, I just wasn't sold on the stars. Stars? On my blog banner? What is that? A sci-fi blog? To boldly go where no blog has gone before? My science fiction-loathing best friend Maureen would never, ever visit here again:

Me: Oh! Today on my blog I...

Mo:  I hate your stupid sci-fi blog. You can suck it and beam me way the hell on out of here.

My goal for the change was just to update my "Minimalistic" design a bit. "Minimalistic" is basically the No Design design and who would pick that? OH. I wasn't looking for anything radical, just a little attempt at refinement. Because the old design had no defined edges. No structure. The red banner just stretched out seemingly to infinity on both sides (Why??), and pretty much everywhere else was white meets white:

 

Old, boring blog.

 

Now, we've got edges with red and headline type with red and sidebar elements with red and RED, RED, RED, RED WELCOME TO MY BORDELLO BLOG:

New, boring blog.

 

And seriously? A picture of this blog post inside of this same blog post? You don't get this kind of Hall-of-Mirrors blogging technique just anywhere, you know. Primarily because nobody wants it. (I actually originally wrote "House of Mirrors" but that's a totally different thing where you go to a carnival fun house and look into all these mirrors that make you look deformed and fat and that's a whole OTHER reason Maureen would never come back here.) But this means I have to put up a placeholder image and then publish this and go back really quickly and take a new screen shot and then insert that and publish again while hoping no one sees this post before I do all of that. Excluding, I believe, anyone who subscribes in a reader. I think you automatically see only the first version. With the wrong screen shot. Although I don't know for sure. Because I don't really understand reader services. Or anything else about blogging, for that matter.

But if I hadn't liked the above theme, my blogging service offers well over a hundred additional pre-defined themes in several categories sure to satisfy anyone's taste (or lack thereof). Here's a very small sampling of some of their "scenes" themes:

 

This one is nice.

 

This is the one I'd use if I wanted to be clinically depressed every day from having to stare at a lonely, dead tree. Which, if I think about it, is way more symbolic to my actual life than I'd really care to admit. Holy sh*t I HATE this design. Sh*thead designer.

 

This is the one I'd use if I wanted to have no male readers ever again.

 

This is what I'd use if I could see Russia from my house. And looking at a polar bear didn't make me at all sad inside because why would it since I know they're not in any way endangered.

 

This is what I'd use if I was Chris. And loved football. And hated baseball. Because I had a profound mental defect.

 

This is what I'd use IF I HATED ALL MY READERS AND WANTED EACH OF YOU TO HAVE A DAILY ANEURYSM. Gag.

 

Below is one more screenshot. This one isn't of a pre-defined theme, except, of course, for the already established theme of This Blog Sucks. I found it here on this very nice blog that doesn't suck, when I was looking up information about "blogging on blogging" because I was thinking that maybe my last few posts on Twitterclouds and Google Searching and blog design AND JON BON JOVI might finally have me poised for a much coveted Technorati authority ranking! Not a high ranking. Just, you know, any ranking. Blog is topical! Witty! Insightful! People should cite my content! (You: WTF content would THAT be?) Although I only think this ranking system has to do with content. It might just be a popularity contest. Not that the distinction between intelligence and popularity really makes that much of a difference since this blog has neither. And since, according to Jeremy Zawodny, it also apparently sucks more than I even realized and how is such a thing possible?? (You: Oh, it's poss... Me: SHUT IT.) If you click on the image it will open up so you can read it more easily:

Notice how I wrote "I'm" with the apostrophe first. Awesome.

 

Jeremy Zawodny would totally hate me. Although I am actually going to attempt a TrackBack to his site when I publish this so maybe he won't hate me as much as he'll love me! Okay, he probably won't love me, but maybe he'll at least like me. Never mind. HE WON'T.

But now that my blog design is all tuned up and I've gotten this little lesson from Jeremy on how to be a better blogger content-wise, maybe tomorrow I will actually put up a real blog post! For you – my loyal readers. Won't that be great?? And since I even already know what the post is going to be about, all I can say is no, it won't be.

If You Got Here By Googling "Boobs In My Face" I'm Guessing This Probably Isn't The Type of Site You Were Actually Looking For

According to Dictionary.com, the word "disappoint" is defined in the following way:

"To fail to fulfill the expectations or wishes of" or "to defeat the fulfillment of hopes." 

Wow. It would suck to be the person who does that.*

Therefore, by logical extension, the definition of the word disappointment is, "the state or feeling of being disappointed" or also – and pay attention here, because this is key – the feeling that overcomes every single solitary person who has ever found themselves on this blog as the result of any type of Google search.**

* I should know.

** SEE???

**********

Innocent Google Searcher:  I will enter my search parameters here!  Various word selecting and typing. Exclamation point to indicate searcher's excitement level. Google searching is fun! The internet is your oyster! Guess what isn't the pearl? "Um...What??" THAT'S WHAT.

Innocent Google Searcher (after a moment scanning the results page):  Hmmmmn. Okay. This one looks good! Note exclamation point. Still excited!! Clicks link to whichever "Um...What??" post has happened to appear.

Innocent Google searcher (after a moment of trying to figure out what he's looking at):  What the hell is THIS sh*t?? This isn't at ALL what I was looking for. I am very disappointed. Searcher crushed. Demoralized. No exclamation point. Immediately clicks off and sends disgruntled, strongly-worded e-mail to Google management. As a side note, did you know that according to ehow.com the exclamation point "can add punch to a sentence when used judiciously" but is also "often overused." Good grief. Please learn to write better, people!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Also? If it wasn't for the internet, I swear I wouldn't know ANYTHING.)

**********

ANYWAY, over the past few days, this kind of mind-numbing disappointment has happened to a lot of teenage girls who spent their precious, youthful time searching for either J0n@s Br0thers or N#ck J0n@s or N#ck J0n@s birthday and came across this post. Which was just like two posts ago. And is probably about six inches below this post. And yet I still put a big link to it. STUPID. Also, I have to type like I have Tourette's or something or else these girls are all gonna end up here again. SUPER-STUPID. Anyway. (OMG am so tired. Have lost all transitional skills. Anyway, anyway, anyway!) Anyway (WHAT DO YOU PEOPLE WANT FROM ME??), most bloggers would KILL for the number of extra page views this post has brought me (about 20 a day). Okay, not most bloggers. Probably hardly any bloggers. Alright, just me. Since before I was averaging a whopping hundred page views a day. Which I am still very proud of, regardless. Especially because I'm sure at least 10 of them probably weren't my mom. And what did these extra girls – I'm assuming they're girls – all find when they got here? They didn't find swooning. They didn't find photo galleries and online squealing. Instead, they just found things like, "Butthead" and "Damn you, Nick J0n@s!" and random pictures of Prince Charles. Do today's teenage girls even know who Prince Charles is? Not unless he was in High School Musical, they don't. Wait, was he? Oh, I don't really know. Or care. Okay, I care. Yeah, right. NO ONE DOES.

Then there was the group of sadly disappointed people who Googled several variations of "Cute blonde who plays with football in NutriSystem ads" (Ugh. Seriously?) and got this piece of crap genius in which I said NOTHING about her being cute or blonde and I THINK GOOGLE MIGHT BE BROKEN. Unless "cute + blonde" equals the same as "obnoxious + boobs in my face." Which I kind of doubt.

Finally (You: ohdeargodthankyou), there was the person who Googled "donkey draw" and ended up on the post about my being a kick ass blogger (which, if you're still reading this far down, you understand is A FALSEHOOD). Was this person searching for instructions on how to draw a donkey? And then all he ended up with was a picture of a donkey that I drew but then admitted one sentence later I didn't actually draw but instead just stole off the internet? I'm sorry, aspiring donkey drawer. And by "drawer" I mean a person who draws donkeys, not "drawer" as in a dresser since a dresser drawer full of donkeys would be kind of inconvenient. Maybe slightly more so for the donkeys than for you. Although it would still probably suck for you too because then where would you put your socks? What do donkeys eat, anyway? And no, this has nothing to do with anything I'm talking about here. Welcome to every single blog post I've ever written.

So as a service to all of my readers – those both intentional and accidental – I offer the following visual aid to help you deal with the never-ending disappointment that is The Google Search. And by "help you" I mean "it won't" because it really has nothing to do with anything except for being some random ad I came across while researching the concept of "disappointment" and mainly I just want you to know that yes, I do extensive amounts of research during the course of verbally barfing carefully drafting every single "Um...What??" post because I care about you all that much. Plus, I have some form of internet ADD and can't stay on any one web page for more than 30 seconds before I have to open 17 more.

Anyway (That's. Right.), here you go:

UPDATE: During the course of my writing the bulk of this post last night, someone found me by Googling "um what blog by leslie." (Can't spell my name right SORT OF INSULTING but blog beggars can't really be choosers.)  Thank you One Whole Person who actually tried to find me on purpose. It's for you that I do all of this.

Oh please. Like there's ANY reason to do any of this. Ever.

It Would Have Been Really Awesome If I'd Remembered To Put The Following In Yesterday's Post (Or: I Wonder If I'll Be Allowed To Blog In Jail?)

The following is an actual conversation in that it actually happened. TWICE.

Mom:  When I die, I want you to spread my ashes on the field at Dodger Stadium.

Me:  What? I can't do that. They'll ARREST me.

Mom:  So?

Me:  Okay, honestly? I do not want to even be having this conversation.

Mom  (after a moment of silence):  I will haunt you. HAUNT you.

Yes, This Post Actually Has The Jonas Brothers In It (I Should Probably Just Delete Entire Blog Now) (Also: HI MOM!)

Last week, two very important people celebrated their birthdays:

This guy:                                                      And this little cutie:
                                                   

The guy on left is Nick Jonas. (You: Who?? Me: Exactly.) He is, apparently, who all the teenage girls are swooning over these days. Which of course makes me wonder what the hell has happened to teenage girls over the past 20 years.

Because hello???

THIS is who we swooned over when I was a teenage girl!

 

 

Who, by the way, looks like this now and I THINK I NEED A MOMENT.

Oh! Sorry!

I'm getting way off track here from my original point.

There's something that never happens always happens every single post.

 

 

And the cute little short-stack on the right? That's my mom. (HI MOM!) Isn't she adorable? I picked that particular photo to post for a few reasons. Because it's always been one of my favorite pictures of her. Because even though she's just a little girl, her face is still so recognizable to me as the first face I knew in life. The first love I knew. The first memories I made. The place I grew my deepest roots. Home. I also picked it because she looks so happy just to be, and that's a feeling I always associate with her and one she always worked so hard to instill in me – something that remains the source of the resiliency and determination I have today. And, oh yeah: I also picked it because there's NO WAY she can call me later and tell me she doesn't like the picture because she thinks she looks too old in it. (HI MOM!)

So my mom's birthday was this past Friday, and Nick Jonas's was Tuesday. The only reason I know anything about Nick's birthday is because I accidentally came across this story. As if I even need to clarify the "accidentally" part because who would read that kind of thing on purpose? Anyway, this news story is basically the lone source of ALL of my knowledge about Nick Jonas, including the fact that he's one of three Jonas brothers when I thought there were only two – although when I took the time to think this is beyond me – and they seem to be very into layering their clothing. After they're done stealing it from Billy Joel and Prince Charles:

      

 

 

 

 

 

Hello?

So, Nick just turned 16 (Big deal! I did that once), and for that incredible accomplishment – and because he's some kind of a heartthrob* and he gets special heartthrob* treatment where treatment equals many, many, many families with young girls give him their money – Nick got to celebrate his birthday at Dodger Stadium.

*Um...no and no:

Hello??

This guy can have MY money.

You know, if I had any.

I'm not giving him any pants though. Because, well, DUH.

 

 

According to the news story, Nick and his brothers rented out Dodger Stadium for two and a half hours so they could play some baseball with their friends. Awwww. Baseball. With their friends. Isn't that cute?? NOT WHEN THOSE TWO AND A HALF HOURS COST $30,000, IT ISN'T. $30,000? For a 16-year-old's birthday party?

Look. I'm just as in favor of kids having fun birthday parties as the next guy. Yayyyyy kids!! (Honestly, I don't really care. I'm just trying to keep all the mommy bloggers from hating me.) But this story disturbs me on several levels, the most obvious being why do these marginally-talented kids have so much money while people like teachers and nurses struggle to make ends meet in today's economy? (Okay, I admit I've never heard their music and am just assuming about the marginally talented thing. So I could be totally wrong in that they could actually have no talent whatsoever.)

And where are their parents in all of this? Do they talk to them about the value of money? Do they remind them that most people would love to have an extra $30,000 so they could do things like buy that new mattress they need (ME) or finally replace their 10-year-old couch (ME) or pay off their credit card bill (ME) or just stop scrimping so much (ME). (ME, ME, ME, ME, MAKE THE CHECK OUT TO ME.) I mean honestly: $30,000 to rent out an entire stadium? And did I mention they also invited only 15 of their friends?? (Which all other things aside is pretty impressive as I certainly don't have 15 friends. Do I even know 15 people? God, I hope not.) That few people? In a gigantic stadium? For less than three hours? For $30,000??

Hey, twit Nick Jonas! If you just want to play some baseball, they have these really cool things all over the place called PARKS, and guess what? THEY'RE FREE. Butthead But if you insist on going the whole stadium route, maybe you could also do something a little more meaningful while you're at it? Like inviting a whole bunch of sick or needy kids in desperate need of some fun to come on out and throw the ball around, too? (CHARITY!) Or maybe have some kind of a contest where you let a bunch of your fans come out with you as there's room for tens of thousands of them anyway? (KINDA CHARITY?) Since, if we want to get technical, it's pretty much their money that funded your little b-ball, b-day shindig. Or maybe you could just, you know, WRITE A CHECK TO CHARITY INSTEAD? You do know we've had some hurricanes and whatnot...right? You don't, do you?

But what also bothers me about such a display is this: My mother did NOT have her birthday celebration at Dodger Stadium. My selfless, loving, amazing, beautiful-inside-and-out mother who has been a Dodgers fan for 49 years did not get such a gift. My mom lives and breathes Dodgers baseball. She bleeds blue. She knows all of the rules of the game of baseball. The stats. The history. The teams. The players. She gets depressed come the end of a season when there are so many months before spring training. My mom loves Dodger Stadium. I swear I think it might be her happiest place on earth. (Disneyland can suck it!) No one I know deserves a fancy, $30,000 Dodgers Baseball Birthday Party more than my lovely mom.

But did she get that? No. Why? Because she didn't have an extra 30 grand lying around, and neither did I. She and my dad poured all their money into taking care of their daughter for so many years. My mom always put herself last so I didn't have to want for things. She made sure I got a college education so I could graduate and someday go on to WRITE A BLOG LIKE THIS THAT DOESN'T PAY ME EVEN ONE CENT OF REVENUE. (HI MOM!!)

And how did I pay her back? By not becoming a pop singing sensation-slash-heartthrob, that's how. By not making anyone swoon over my Musical Stylings and Stage Presence and therefore not having an extra $30,000 lying around so I could gift my mom in the manner she deserves. Yes, I know: I could've become a doctor or investment banker or something too, but that has nothing to do with the theme of this post, now does it? Please try to follow along.

Mom? In short? I suck.

What I wouldn't give to be able to throw my mom a party at Dodgers stadium. And if I did, you can bet it would last longer than two and a half hours and would include ACTUAL DODGERS PLAYERS doing things like serving her drinks and rubbing her feet. Throughout my life she's fulfilled so many of the desires of my heart – what I wouldn't give to be able to just once return the favor in totally grand style. But I know that no matter what I do, I could never repay all the invaluable gifts she's given to me over the years: Security. A defined sense of self. Strength. Confidence. The belief that as a woman, I could do anything. The belief that as her daughter, I could do anything. The freedom to fail. The tools to succeed. At once, both roots and wings.

Sigh.

Damn you, Nick Jonas!

But my mom does have one thing going for her on her birthday that little Nicky Jonas doesn't: Her birthday - September 19th – is also National Speak Like A Pirate Day! Avast, mateys!! Walk the plank, Jonas Brothers. And in honor of THAT, I have made my mom THIS:

Here? She also looks young! But in addition? PIRATEY.

Mom?

You are welcome. And I love you. A lot.

And one more thing to the person who wrote that little article:  It's DODGER Stadium - not Dodgers Stadium. The team name has an "s" but the stadium name doesn't.

Hello?? It's called a fact checker.

You are welcome, too.

 

This Post Mentions Both My Butt And My Cat's Butt

Hey, lesleykim! Twitter called and they'd like their 140 characters back. But mostly they'd like you to close your account. And lose their website address. And – oh yeah! – stick this Fail Whale up your butt!:

(Seriously: Did you know you could get a Fail Whale on a t-shirt? ME NEITHER.)

 

The image at the tippy top of this post is my Twitter Tag Cloud. It shows – via the size of the corresponding text – what I tweet about the most. And as it turns out? I tweet about pretty much the same thing I blog about: Absolutely nothing that has any point. ("Hey there!" one whole reader left who hasn't already figured this out.)

I mean what does it say about me that my most tweeted word is maybe, followed closely by would, could and should? Well, besides saying I AM A WISHY WASHY TWEETER, it also says, Never mind that – when the hell did I ever tweet about a basement? I don't even HAVE a basement.

Random basements aside (and the obvious fact I clearly must direct tweet at Chris in annoying amounts – both Chris and haliscribbler appear on the next tier SORRY DUDE), my Twitter Tag Cloud seems less of a direct representation of what I tweet about and more of a general statement about my life as a whole. (And by statement I mean those things I never make with any kind of substance whatsoever and who gives a crap what I tweet and why haven't you all just unfollowed me by now??) These days my life is completely stalled at the intersection of Maybe meets Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda and no one is directing traffic and I THINK I'M DRIVING WITH A BLINDFOLD ON. (You know, where life = car and living = driving and OH WHATEVER.)

I feel just this side of futile a lot these days. Like all my steps ahead in fact just move me around in a circle and I keep ending up back where I started. Except not only do I still have no answers, now I also have more and more questions. Maybe The Porcupine and I will get there? Maybe we'll all be okay? Or at least maybe we won't die? Okay maybe we'll die but death will be painless? OH WHAT'S THE POINT WE'RE ALL TOTALLY DOOMED. And besides my attempt to look forward, I also do a fair amount of looking back: Oh if only one of us would have...(pointless) or maybe I should have...(useless) because then maybe today we could have...(fail!). OOH! Maybe I can have another Fail Whale for this? But maybe on a cool t-shirt this time instead of up my butt?

And on some days – as hard as I try to rally against it (because other people have real problems like hurricane-ravaged homes and not enough money to pay bills and plus? Nepal is outlawing nude disco dancing and WTF are people over there supposed to do?) – these maybes kind of get me down. Maybe someday this constant panicked feeling will leave me. Maybe someday I'll sleep again at night. Maybe someday The Porcupine will be a little more the man I used to know and a little less the ghost in front of me. Maybe someday soon I will be a little more "actual" happy and a little less "fake it 'til you make it" happy. (I've used this "fake it" mentality since getting it from my skating coach back when I was learning how to do a single axel jump, which is actually a revolution and a half, and yes this is absolutely as impressive as it sounds.*  My coach would say, "Fake it 'til you make it!" and so I would smile while falling down.)

* Okay: The following is an actual conversation between a five-year-old girl and a then 33-year-old me. The five-year-old is being referred to as "Five-Year-Old" only because I'm guessing calling her "Smart-Ass Bitch Face" is probably frowned upon by various mommy bloggers and parental organizations everywhere, all of which I am totally sure could give one sh*t about read this blog:

Five-Year-Old (after watching me work on my axel for a while): We're practicing the same jump!

Me:  I know! Isn't that kind of fun?!

Five-Year-Old:  Aren't you way too old for this?

Me: (Falls.)

And in case you're wondering what this has to do with anything I'm talking about, the answer is very little. HAHA! Please. Everyone knows the answer is nothing.

ANYWAY. On the days the maybes are kicking my ass – which has been a lot of my days as of late – I do the same thing to that little "What are you doing?" Twitter box that I do to my blog: I just stare at it. What am I doing? Um, what the hell am I ever doing? (AM I EVEN AWAKE RIGHT NOW? ANYONE?) I sit here in the weird state of suspended animation my life has become, watching all the lovely people I follow tweeting all these interesting and entertaining and witty and pithy things and I'm still sitting there puzzling over what exactly it is I might be doing besides breathing. What am I doing? Am I even doing anything? Well, I am trying to think of something to tweet so does that count? Being that my last two tweets were about my cable company and my cat's shaved butt, uh, NO.

And that's when Twitter can just freak me the hell out. In 140 characters or less I'm reminded of how much life is going on around me and how even though in my own way I'm doing the best I can to participate – I'm falling down a lot but I'm smiling, dammit – I still feel a bit outside of the ebb and flow most of the time these days. I'm not adrift – I have wonderful family and friends who moor me – but I am almost weightless. Long on maybes. Short on tangibles. At times feeling almost without substance.

Clearly, this intangibility I feel comes across in my tweets: Maybe? I dunno? Could or would? Should? Basement? (Screw you Thank you for the insight, Twitter Tag Cloud!) It also comes across in this blog when there are three or four days between posts because the ugly maybes have crept in and I am far from my best and want only to bring my best to this blog. (Because I love you, Blog!) (Blog as boyfriend?)

YES, I KNOW. Begging the question: "Oh my god does she think THIS crap is her best?" Yes. I. Do.

And, oh yeah: If you'd like a Twitter Tag Cloud of your own, you can get one here. I have next to no idea what anything on this page means except for the part that says, "View Your Twitter Tag Cloud Now." PHP?  Rest Service? Zend Framework? XFN? Who cares?! The site's author's kinda cute right? And 12-ish? Am I dumber than a 12-year-old?

MAYBE.

I Am Too Damn Busy Baking Pies And Wearing Aprons And Hand-Washing Laundry To Understand "Sports"

We're sorry for taking so long between posts this week, readers! "Um...What??" has been a little uncharacteristically "Ewe...SICK??" for a few days now, thus rendering it impossible for this blog to live up to its normal standards. You know, if it actually had any.

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

Oh, NutriSystem.

You make me want to stuff my face with cheese-covered fried cheese dipped in melted cheese just to spite you. You also make me want to send you a photo of myself holding a newspaper with today's date to remind you that it isn't 1954 and, oh yeah, JUNE CLEAVER IS DEAD.

This?

Is not me or any other woman I know.

And if I did know her?

I would in all likelihood put that pie in her face.

But seriously though. That's a nice oven, right? Isn't It? Oh, I have no idea. I've never even opened mine and have only a vague idea where it actually is.

As a woman, which I'm assuming is a large part of your target demographic, NutriSystem, I find the commercial you're currently airing with Jillian Barberie (and by Jillian Barberie I mean OHMYGOODGAWWWDSHADDUP) to be annoying and insulting to women at a level second only to every single commercial spot ever run by eHarmony. (WHO CAN GO BANKRUPT ANY TIME NOW, PLEASE.)

I won't go so far as to embed the clip of Jillian's commercial here because I care about you all that much and already feel guilty enough even subjecting you to the following screen shots. But the gist of story by way of introduction goes a little something like this: Girl gains weight (more on this later), girl is better than all the rest of us lesser-type girls watching the commercial because of something having to do with football (to be honest, I don't really get it but whatever) and then girl loses weight THE END.

And now? The same story in seven easy-to-follow images. It's like "Dick and Jane" (low-level reading skills) meets The Iliad (nobody knows WTF it's supposed to mean) only with really unfortunate fashion:

>

1. If you see this? THERE IS STILL TIME TO RUN OUT OF THE ROOM.

 

2. Jillian (OHMYGOODGAWWWDSHADDUP) says hello and introduces us to her "BEFORE" self and her "AFTER" self! This is even more boring just as exciting as you might think.

 

3. Here, we learn that OHMYGOODGAWWWDSHADDUP is an amazing and unique type of woman because she has gigantic boobs she likes sports:

"Listen! I know I'm not your average gal. I LOVE sports!!" Then, she catches a football tossed to her from off camera and declares, "FOOTBALL!" Just like that. Just that one word. Noun naming game? Some form of object-related Tourettes? Intelligence level of two-year-old? And as if this wasn't bad enough, she follows up her outburst with, "How many girls can do THAT??"

Seriously??? Catch something?

Listen yourself, OHMYGOODGAWWWDSHADDUP. Unless that thing was hurled at you from a hundred yards away by either Peyton Manning or Donovan McNabb...no wait. I still wouldn't give a crap. Plus, what does this have to do with anything? Nothing. LOGIC FAIL.

 

4. There are NO WORDS.

               

5. Good lord. I think there's some technical information given in here somewhere too. You know, pricing and meal plans and blah blah blah I do not care as I'm just busy staring at her ta tas. (WHO ISN'T??)

         

6. Football thrown AGAIN from, let's be honest, probably two inches off camera at most. Plus, I totally suspect at this point whoever threw it might have been "accidentally" aiming at her head. I'm guessing this football/sports thing is repeated just in case you did not understand this symbolism the first time around. The good news is you won't understand it the second time either. "Get NutriSystem and SCORE!!" What the hell does THIS mean, exactly? Some form of not-so-vague sexual reference aimed at the same group of people who laugh at armpit farts? (Which is ridiculous because any intelligent person will tell you only REAL farts are funny.) Furthermore, does it also imply only skinny girls can have sex? And anyway, who plays football in their lingerie top??? LADIES IN THE LINGERIE BOWL, THAT'S WHO. Hut hut!!

       

7. Finally, we have arrived at the bitter end, and by bitter, I mean ME.

                        

Look, NutriSystem. You annoy me. Not only are women more than collections of hot pink lingerie and vacuous expressions but, um, A LOT OF US LOVE SPORTS. And by a lot of us? I MEAN A LOT OF US. You know, that is when we can find time to sneak in watching a game or two between doing loads of laundry (BY HAND) and polishing the silver and thinking of ways to please our man and speaking only when spoken to. And Jillian ("SHADDUP" for short), I am not sure how much of this is your fault, but I'm going to try to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you were following a script. Although, really? Just for doing so? Female fail.

And here's a little something else you neglected to mention, NutriSystem:

Yeah.

There's a reason Ms. Jillian felt heavier and then suddenly didn't:

It's called PUSHING SOMETHING OUT OF YOUR MOTHER NATURE AND THEN GIVING IT A BOTTLE. Or two boobs. Or...holy MOLY those are some serious boobs. And yes, I know I neglected to draw any kind of happy face on either one of them, but really? Some things just go without saying.

Who knows? Maybe this is an accidental oversight or maybe she talks about the pregnancy in some other NutriSystem commercial that maybe I haven't seen AND ABSOLUTELY DO NOT WANT TO.

Also? I saw EIGHT eHarmony commercials during the course of slapping together carefully crafting this sh*tty-ass amazing post. Only it's a different couple now, and not Lee and Anne Marie, which leads me to the obvious conclusion that Lee and Anne Marie have already broken up. I certainly hope my earlier, thought-provoking post had nothing to do with it, because that would be awesome make me feel badly.

AND????? I burped AT LEAST 15 TIMES (!!!) while I was writing this, which has nothing to do with anything except for the fact that I don't think I've burped 15 times total before IN MY ENTIRE LIFE and WTF is wrong with me and this leads me to another obvious conclusion that NUTRISYSTEM GIVES ME GAS.

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For those of you suddenly not so sure you're happy I've resurfaced here...I totally understand.

This Post Contains More Miracles! (But No Burning Bush, So You Could End Up TOTALLY DISAPPOINTED)

My apparent run of miracles (Think: Bloggess!) has continued as Friday brought me yet two more of them! In that one day! (Yes, Friday. Yes, today is Monday. "Um...What?" is nothing if not timely.)

Miracle #1: A friend I thought was gone from me forever was suddenly, surprisingly, totally, completely, this-ly and that-ly back in my life. And for the record (those of you who remember this post), for once I wasn't the one doing the scrapheaping. He was. Except that he wasn't. I just thought he was. While he was thinking I was. Because it was a big misunderstanding brought on by the fact that communicating by e-mail can sometimes be dangerous (due to the lack of body language and tone of voice to help clarify the words themselves) and the other fact that A LARGE PORTION OF THE TIME I AM RATHER AN IDIOT.

I mean we did hit a fairly major snag in our friendship – the kind of snag the two of us just never had. But we were working through it and getting ourselves out to the other side. Then? I sent him an e-mail where after days on end of heavy-duty-major-poopy I was trying to lighten things up by attempting to be super-duper-jokey-casual. Sounds good, right? OF COURSE NOT. It sounds like what it was – idiotic. Total Lack of Sensitivity FAIL. And the e-mail set off a chain reaction of one idiotic thing after another where he thought that I thought that he thought...and I thought that he thought that I thought...and are you following all of this so far? Me neither. But before I knew it I was looking back across an entire year of my not following any of it. An entire year of the lines of communication – after months of their being completely shot to sh*t – just going profoundly dark. Communication COLD CASE. No clues, no trails, no answers...no fair.

But now he's back and all the things I wouldn't let myself think about as being so wrong in the situation (being busy and whatnot with thinking about ALL THE ENTIRE REST OF MY LIFE BEING ALL FLOOPING SCREWED UP AND WRONG) have been set right again. Yes, it was that easy. Yes, we picked up right where we left off. Yes, life can still surprise me. And yes, I'm going to do my best to carry this mindset into my other situation. Life can still surprise you, girl. Keep on keeping on.

Miracle #2: And if the symbolic reattachment of a missing limb isn't miraculous enough for you, when Maureen and I met after work for dinner and martinis at our favorite haunt, Salt Creek (Swooon! Best dirty martinis in town!*), the waitress actually carded us. And by "waitress" I mean "obviously legally blind person." Never mind that it was night and we were sitting outside in the partial dark and never mind that we're kinda almost just a few years from legal drinking age times two, all I know is that somebody thought we should be drinking Shirley Temples and if I ever meet any of you for the first time, we're totally hooking up at Salt Creek outside at night where upon seeing me you'll marvel at how a 16-year-old manages to write worse than a five-year-old such a mature and insightful blog. (HAHA RIGHT! Would type in Crayola Crayon font if Typepad had such a thing.)

Miracles #3 - 4 (and possibly 5-6?): And oh yeah – I'm not quite done yet: Over the course of the rest of the weekend? "Um...What??" gained a few more people fooled into clicking over here readers!!! Including Bossy. And by "Bossy" I mean "NO THAT IS NOT A TYPO." Holy crap – Bossy was here. (Ssshhh. I think she's kind of quiet about these things.) And – AND?! – Maggie of Okay. Fine. Dammit. and THIS IS NOT A TYPO EITHER. What the HELL?? If I didn't believe in miracles I'd be starting to wonder right about now if maybe I'm stuck in some kind of bizarro world? Where only opposite-from-normal things happen? Like maybe soon I'll also get windfall of big bags of money and maybe Pamela Anderson-type tan??

Burning bushes are for amateurs.

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*Mom:  "Soooo. What are you eating for dinner? Olives?" (Mocked by OWN MOTHER.)

Tomorrow Maybe Blog Will Have Burning Bush?

Due to what has to be a clerical error or inebriated clicking (Maybe Bloggess momentarily drunkie?) (Sometimes Um...What?? momentarily drunkie too. BFF's now maybe?) or router short-circuit or browser misdirection or divine intervention or MAYBE BECAUSE SHE HAD A GUN POINTED AT HER HEAD (which might seem less scary/borderline fun if happening when drunkie), there has been a genuine miracle among us:

BLOGGING ROYALTY has been here!!:

   

(Giving You More Bang For Your Blogging Buck.)

 

Hi, Bloggess!! All I can say in my own defense is that this blog isn't always like this. Sometimes it's even worse.

Notice how I've finally figured out how to center a picture within a post?? (Assuming any of you have ever noticed any pictures in this blog at all. NO ONE CARES.) I was momentarily worried this kind of formatting excellence would impact my quest to win the "Worst Blog Ever" award but then realized having The Bloggess post a comment here probably already took me out of the running anyway as now entire content of site can no longer by labeled as "CRAP." (Just all the parts that were written by me.) (Maybe there's a percentage? Like can still be "Worst Blog Ever" if only .05% of content isn't sh*tty?)

So thanks for stopping by, Bloggess! We are dumbfounded honored by your presence here. Because of you, this blog's meteoric rise to fame continues!! And by meteoric rise I mean this blog is going nowhere but into the toilet.

Maybe I Can Win "Best Post Title" For This Post Title!

Do you use Twitter?

If so, did you know that all your tweets could potentially win you a "Twitties" award? Me neither.

This is very disheartening to me. First of all, because no one ever bothered to tell me about the "Twitties" so I've been tweeting dumb ass crap like, "@iamdebra ohmeeeeeeholygooooeygawwwdyummmmmy." Had I known I could actually win an award, I would have tweeted a little more intelligently like remembering to capitalize the first letter. Second of all, must EVERYTHING in the blogging-related world be a competition?? The answer is YES, and I didn't know this either. IDIOT.

When I started this blog a couple months ago (you are welcome my two-to-three readers) (whom I in no way pay to be here) I thought I would just log on, write some stuff that would entertain my friends (and by they would be "entertained" I mean they would be "forced to read my blog via the excessive use of my acting pathetic") and this would repeat over and over and everyone would live Happily Ever After, although mostly me because I have a completely captive audience so many wonderful friends.

Yes. This kind of thinking is what we call "Living in La La Land" or "THINKING DONE BY PEOPLE WHOSE HEADS ARE UP THEIR BUTTS." It didn't take me long to discover that blogging isn't simply blogging. Instead, it's serious business and there are awards and competitions and voting and judging and also? There are, on average, 962,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 new blogs created every 3.7 seconds and who has the kind of time needed to read that kind of volume? No one, that's who, which is why your blog needs to be award winning so readers will flock to you. At least I'm guessing. Honestly, I really have no idea. IDIOT.

So as near as I can figure out after giving this no much deep thought because who cares these things are very important, there seem to be a couple different types of blog awards. First, there are the awards that bloggers pass around to each other. Like, you are a "Thinking Blogger" (will never win this one) or you are a "Kind Blogger" (Sh*tty kind? Could own this?) or you are a "Brilliant Blogger." (Will never win this one EVEN MORE. Should fold blog now.) These awards seem to be the kind you get to vote on all by yourself. Someone gives one to you then you get to pick on whom you want to bestow it. They're kind of like virtual hugs bloggers give each other. I'm not sure if they actually mean anything but they feel good, right? And on this note, I actually won a Kick Ass Blogger award a couple weeks back. But I didn't have five people I could pass it along to. Not because I think the bloggers I know DO NOT kick ass but because I pretty much don't know hardly any bloggers. Perhaps there is World's Loneliest Blogger Award, and I could have that one??

Then, there are much more official type awards. Awards in categories where you must initially be nominated and then other bloggers and blogging experts and various juries made up of bloggers and blogging experts will scrutinize and judge you (not your blog but YOU) and hold your entire blogging future in their hands and no, I have absolutely no idea who any of these people are, but I am fairly certain that one of them ISN'T my mom so I doubt I have much of a chance of garnering a nomination let alone an actual vote. (Although here is another thing: COMMENTS are also, apparently, another important litmus test against which to measure Actual Blog Worth. And while my mom reads this blog regularly she never ever comments officially, which says to me, "I love you and all, but no way am I gonna be publicly associated with this crap." Same with several of my friends. So again, should probably fold blog now.)

After much research – and by "research" I mean I Googled "Blog Awards" and then clicked on the first site I found because I've already wasted spent way too much time on this and plus I had to pee – I've come to the conclusion that the "Blogger's Choice Awards" are the big ones. Because these are the ones that are voted on by your blogging peers. And what could possibly be more important in the world of blogging than one-upping your blogging peers? And surely with a little effort and a decent amount of focus I should have as good a shot as anyone at winning one of these, right? OF COURSE NOT.

But never mind that. I've studied the category list for this competition very carefully and have determined the areas where I might actually be able to bring home a GIGANTIC, FANCY TROPHY or a web badge or whatever that says I WIN! I'M BETTER THAN YOU! I am a serious blogger:

 

I've crossed out the categories I immediately recognized I shouldn't even try for. Like Hottest Daddy Blogger? Requires sex change and child. You can see how this would be daunting. Also, don't want to open a corporation or give up chips. But the categories I've circled are the ones I know I could be seriously in the running for if given a year's time to prepare! Look out Blog....sphere? O-sphere? Blogotopia? Blogneyland! (Sigh. MORON.) And the categories I haven't touched? Middle ground. Who knows? Who cares? About any of this, frankly. I sure as hell don't. So, unless you're someone who was so completely inspired by reading this post that you just made this blog your home page, well to be honest you should have stopped reading thousands of words ago. Now might be a good time to click over to The Bloggess (AWESOME) Or Dooce. Or even some website with a live feed of PAINT DRYING. Because, well...better. (Seriously. There will be NO pay off here.)

And for those of you still reading at this point? If only the last category had been listed first I could have saved us all a lot of time and trouble because ta da!! Look at it!: "Worst Blog of All Time." And the reason I was born suddenly makes sense. And if you think I wouldn't proudly display my "Worst Blog Of All Time" badge at the top of my home page, well then that is what is called "You Clearly Haven't Met Me" and there would be car magnets and t-shirts and beer mugs and mouse pads and I would seriously look into changing my URL to something like WORSTBLOGEVER.SUCKSBIGASS.COM.

Fakin' it 'til I make it:

And then maybe once I am recognized as an Award Winning Blogger, high-profile tweeters will answer my direct tweets (YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE, WIL WHEATON) (And DARTH VADER) because my tweets will then be taken seriously at which time? I WILL WIN A TWITTIES. ("Twitty" singular? "Twittie?" TWIT???? Sigh. STILL AN IDIOT.)

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Although really? Considering the state of this post, it's just this side of a miracle I can communicate ANY thought EVER in 140 characters or less. Someone give me an award for that.