Um...What??

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.

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.

Sailing My Dinghy of Mediocrity On A Sea Of Excellence

This is my friend Lori on her horse, Pino. I mean I realize I might sound sort of biased since she is my friend and all, but look at her! Can YOU do that??? I wouldn't even begin to know how to haul my butt up onto a horse, let alone figure out how to get him to jump over things. "Heyyyy. Soooo. Wanna go over there? And maybe jump over that? No? Okay. We'll just sit here then. Nice horsey." Plus, could you rock a hat like that and still look like such a sex bomb? Lori can!

She sent this shot to me last week and I was struck by how many years of hard work and how many countless days of getting up at an ungodly hour and how much time sacrificed with family and friends and how many big bags full of money must go into making it look that easy. Because don't they look effortlessly gorgeous together? To me, it doesn't even matter what the end result is. (Because for all I know they totally bit it in the next frame.) (Except for that THEY DIDN'T.) It's the quest itself that matters – the effort to be great. It's in the training and the hard work and the dedication to your particular passion – whatever it may be – that excellence lies. And excellence in general? Gets me all saucy. And that kind of excellence from my friends? Well, it just makes me think really deep, profound thoughts like HOLY CRAP, I AM A KICKASS FRIEND PICKER. Because you can pick your friends, and you can pick your nose, but okay this seriously has nothing to do with anything I'm talking about right now.

Then I got to thinking about how many of my friends have these different, wonderful talents and how I'm just like that too except for the way that I have NONE. Lori has her horses. Mo could gourmet-cook Martha Stewart's uppity ass right out of her own kitchen. (Although maybe she could just cook Martha Stewart. Martha STEW-art. MMmm. Because then? Martha would have to just SHUT IT and wouldn't that be awesome?) Unfortunately, I can't find any pictures of Mo actually cooking, so instead here is a really, really incredibly rare shot of us drinking:

(It's true I will only drink things that match whatever shirt I'm wearing.)

Mo could also Home Improvement Project the hell out of any part of your house. And I'm not talking about sissy girl crap like stenciling or throwing around pillows, either. I mean using actual power tools. (I own a hammer. For putting up pictures.)

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Chris is an artist. Besides conceptualizing very brilliant layouts and photoshoots day in and day out for his job, he also creates these amazing, vibrant illustrations.

See?

This one is kinda scary though. Run, meatball, run!

Hello? Is anyone else hungry here?

Plus, He is also really good at Going To The Gym. See here.

And my friend Tuna? He paints.

See?

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And takes amazing photographs.

See?

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He also makes stained glass art. Stained glass. And it's beautiful.

See??

Who do you know who can do THIS? Although really, Tuna? This many skills all for one person? A slight bit selfish, no???

Honestly though. I don't know why these people even talk to me. But they do. Somehow, I've managed to secretly infiltrate all their overtly extreme excellence with my undercover rampant mediocrity. I can't ride a horse. I can't cook. I can't install your kitchen cabinets. I can't even draw a square that incorporates any actual right angles. And stained glass? That doesn't involve three-day old Seagram's 7 crusted in the bottom of a highball in my sink? Durrr.

So then I got to thinking about how these things are actually no small feats, right? They involve specific and definite talents – a lot of which are God-given, if you ask me. So should I feel badly just because I don't possess them? Sure! Why not!? Feeling badly: IT'S WHAT I DO. Plus, I can expend even more energy feeling badly over all of the regular things I can't do either! Like:

I can't ride a bike. That's right. I said it. Two wheels? I don't get it, because that's about six wheels too few. Rollerskating was my thing as a kid, so I could never be bothered with bicycles. Consequently, that skill ended up getting by me. Of course there's not really much of a call for rollerskating these days. Except maybe for the Roller Derby. But I'm far too fond of my own teeth for that. I do have a lot of inner rage, though, and that seems to come in handy in the sport. I also think I'd look pretty awesome in the helmet, but not as good as Lori would, and that would just make me jealous. I could also maybe qualify for a job at A&W, but leaving me unsupervised for any length of time around burgers and fries would only result in the jumbo-sizing of my ass. HAHA! Okay, anyone who's been paying any kind of attention here knows we've already covered the fact that this will NEVER happen, regardless of HOW many burgers I may stuff into my yap. The ass? Is destined for eternal flatness.

I can't drive a stick shift. I have no idea how common or uncommon this is, but I think I'm the only person I know who can't. So if you drive a stick and I'm a passenger in your car and you have a heart attack or are rendered some other form of life-threatening unconscious and we have no cell reception which means I can't dial 911 and instead must Drive You Immediately To The Hospital Myself, well I am very sorry, BUT YOU ARE GOING TO DIE.

I can't sew on a button. We've already established I can't cook. So maybe I can sew?!! HAHA! Full-on sewing aside (Because wouldn't that be great? I could make a little blankie for Lori's horse, or an apron for Mo to cook in or maybe a camera cozy for Tuna?), I can't even sew on a button. Pathetic! Sometimes I have to try though, so I just do that thing where you loop and loop and loop and loop the thread until it makes a big overblown thread blob and you can't see the actual button under it anymore but that's strictly secondary because at least the button won't fall off. You know, until the thread eventually works itself loose because I also can't figure out how to tie it off right. And I never have thread in a color that matches, either. Which has nothing to do with anything except for furthering the ugliness.

I can't blow my nose while standing up. I swear to God, I will BLACK OUT.

I can't parallel park. I have little need to ever do this in my life, though I doubt any amount of practice would likely make much of a difference. So, If I had to parallel park in order to go to a party at your house where Dwayne Johnson and Mike Piazza and Vincent D'Onofrio were all attending AND handing out gift cards to Sephora in between rounds of fist-fighting over who gets to make out with me first (well, Dwayne would be hitting people over the head with a folding chair because once The Rock, always The Rock), I would just have to go back home. And if your life depended on my successfully parallel parking? Well, MORE DYING FOR YOU.

As for all the OTHER things I can't do that aren't even listed here? Well, this is enough for now because none of us has that kind of time, and seriously: Why are you even still reading this?? (Can't balance my checkbook, but it's called online banking, HELLO?; can't keep a potted plant alive, can't ever clean a mirror without leaving big streaks and anyway, I don't think ANYONE can do this last thing.) But if there's any truth to the idea that you can judge someone by the company they keep, well I'm doing pretty well for myself. I am Excellent By Association and I'm okay with that.

And also? I have a really excellent rack.

Which, all things considered, probably doesn't hurt.