Slight Rant

I swear.

I don't have the energy to rant too much. But I feel compelled to pontificate upon the inordinate number of sexist men I encounter on a daily basis. I truly find in hard to believe.

The men I work with directly aren't overtly sexist. But peripheral employees and far too many customers talk at me like I'm three and/or dumb as a fucking bucket of ducks (no direct assault on ducks, here). I've never been treated like anything less than cogent, more or less sane, semi-intelligent being in my life--even when I *was* three.

This guy, relatively prominent, I can only assume successful, just called and , when I told him that one of our employees wouldn't be in until later, lilted, "Hoooonnnnney, he'll be in in juuuussst a minnnnute. We're filming later. Now you be shoooore to tell him _______. Now do think you can you do that foooorrr meeee? Huuuhh? Now he might slip in the back door on yaaa, but you be shoooore to tell him, wonnnn't yaaa?"

Gah, if you could have heard the condescension! Made me want to barf!

I've experienced a relatively persistent nagging feeling regarding this, well, what I can only assume is sexist behavior, since I started work here. Hitherto, I've not really taken time to put my irritation into stable thought, because it irritates me beyond belief to realize how backward people are.

And I don't necessarily mean people "around here." I mean People Everywhere.

I swear.

Get it together people! Step out of your fucking Neanderthal modes of thought, behavior, and action! If I am inferior in any way (which I'm yet to be convinced that I am), it sure as hell isn't because I'm female...

Tread on Trina: Blinding Rage Revisited

Apparently, I've got, tatooed on my forehead, the words "Treat Trina Like Shit."
It's lovely.
Everyone come look at it.
Take heed, too, and do as it commands.
Don't know what it is about me that insists that I be tread upon.
Don't know what I project that causes people to do as such.
Well, fuck everybody.
Really.
That means you.
Yes, you.
And you, too.

Blinding Rage.

Okay, I've kept it in as long as I can: It's time for a rant.

Yesterday (and increasingly lately), I was subject to several bouts of uncontrollable rage. I get this way sometimes. Generally, these types of outbreaks manifest themselves in a series of odd dreams in which my rage is directed at someone close to me: my mother, my best friend, my dad. Not people I'm even mad at in life, most times, I just have the random dreams. And normally, I have three or four dreams, and the whole mess unconsciously passes.

However, lately, I'm having blinding rage at work, consciously and in waking hours, no less. The whole world, it seems, is fucking around - laying guilt trips, suppressive stress, and general anxiety through passive aggressive sublimation.

That's one thing, and certainly nothing new. But when people call and tell me that I'm doing things wrong, scheduling pages incorrectly, questioning MY fucking GRAMMAR, I draw the line.

Yesterday, a woman wanted to place an ad. She'd written "Will sit with the elderly, M-F, blah, blah, blah..." So, under the employment section of my schedule, I created a page that said, "Seeking a position sitting with the elderly. Blah." (Blah not included, of course.) This is all grammatically correct, yes? Does that ad indicate that she WANTS a job perched next to old people? I certainly thought so.

Moving on. She calls me next day. Says, ""Oh, I've got tons a calls, but ever-buddy thinks I NEED someone to sit with me. Someone called and said you got it written wrong on there. You must have it wrong."

"Ma'am," I say, forcing calm I do not feel. "It says, 'Seeking a position sitting with the elderly."

"Yeah," she says. "Well that means I need someone the sit with me. I don't. I'm LOOKING for a job."

Is that what it means? I was under the impression that 'seeking a position' meant 'looking for a job.' Perhaps I'm wrong. I think, maybe, I'm on some crazy pills - insane antibiotics, deranged diet pellets, something! It wasn't just that she was mistaken, it was that alllll these other people were under the same falacious misconception. Who's wording is wrong? Mine or the rest of humanity's?

So I changed her ad. It now reads: "I will sit with the elderly." Coarsely primitive, I think. I try to keep up a neat channel - keep grammar, spelling, the general aesthetic pleasing and above standard. But now I've got this big, sore thumb sticking out there, screaming, "Look at this prehistoric phrasing!"

This episode by itself just really pissed me off. But several other occurences in conjunction- each to lengthy and mostly pointless for me to explain in my special verbose way - have generated blinding rage. By the end of most days recently, I generally just say, "Fuck you all, I'm going home." Well, in so many words.

(Tangentially, I've only every said "Fuck you" twice in my life. Both times to my dad, strangely enough.)

Anyway. I realize that I'm SO dramatic about EVERYTHING. I hate that. It's exhausting. I think what made me angriest of all WAS the fact that these trivial things inspired such unaccounted for anger. Eff.

Well, that's all I've got energy to rant about for now.

Peace out, Homeskillets.

Words.

Things are shit and I don't feel like dealing constructively with it, so in the mean time... here are fun things to say:
Labeling anything "Spooky."
"Creepy Peeper"
"Homeskillet"
"Gear"
"Behelmeted"

Peas.

Lately there’s been, it seems, an onslaught of negativity in my life, in my mind, in the people I love. Too much stress, too much worry, too much uncertainty. Thus, I’ve compiled a brief list of things that make me peaceful. I’ve found it largely beneficial, if only for a moment zen.

Happy Mitten thoughts:
-Daffodils - the friendliest flower
-Smells: Old books, the manufactured smell of department stores, the bitter tang of geranium leaves, chapstick, freshly tilled dirt, sassafras, the coffee aisle, my mother
-Removing the insides of pumpkins
-OK Go, The Hush Sound, The Fratellis, Oasis, Mika
-Driving with the windows open
-Danny Elfman
-Summer fireflies at dusk
-Orange Sherbert
-Movies (In general)
-Movie Theaters (again)
-Mothers who are motherly (specifically mine)
-Best friends
-Lucy the little angel with a propeller tail
-The Green of the world
-Talladega Nights
-Being alone-The Enchanted Forest Chronicles
-Swimming alone
-"You’ve Got Mail," QVC, cooking shows, infomercials, & demonstrations
-The invigorated, inspired feeling I get after leaving a movie theater
-Sleeping alone
-The Cheshire Cat & "Jabberwocky"
-Intense men, women, children, & dogs.
-"Virtual Insanity," "We Didn’t Start the Fire," "Life is a Rock," "I’ve Been Everywhere," "Stand," "It’s the End of the World As We Know It," "Piano Man," "American Pie"
-Listening to people genuinely enthuse.
These make me still.

Bloody Donors!

Now, it seems, not only to strange people call me daily, but bizarre dramatic encounters course at my heels.

Yesterday, whilst donating blood in a drive for work, I single-handedly managed to traumatize an entire bloodmobile full of people.

The process, up until the point of disaster, had gone relatively smoothly, considering there were about 20 people crammed into the waiting area, and all four blood donating receptacles were occupied. Usually, there's a big to-do about finding a vein in my arm. And there was, but one nurse expertly stuck the needle in my arm without having to poke the needle around inside my arm several times first.

Yet, I had no sooner remarked at how quickly she managed to get the needle situated, than - SPLUT! One of the already full vials of blood attatched to one of the tubes in my arm came flying off, splattering blood all over the floor and chairs.

Suddenly, we all hear, "Um, Penny! I need you over here, ASAP!"

The people in the waiting area behind me were freaking out, whilst two people already donating blood took one look at the floor and passed out! I kid you not. The place was pandemonic, one nurse grabbing cold compresses and drinks for the distressed, while another suited herself with something straight out of "Outbreak," carefully mopping up the unsettling splatters of plasma all over the bus.

I just sat there, freakishly fascinated. 'Perhaps,' I thought to myself, 'I should be the one freaking out, as it's my blood all over town.'

I sensed that it would do little good to tell them that I was undiseased, and though the whole situation was decidedly gross (to everyone not named 'Trina'), there was no chance of anyone contracting AIDs or any strange, as-yet-unnamed airborn blood disease.

'Good-night!' I thought, 'It's always something with me.'

However, it wasn't long, effete with having so righteously freaked out such a large quantity of people, until I found the whole debacle enormously funny.

I am sorry that those people passed out. Bummer. I am told, though, that they made a full recovery a short while later.

Well, that's all for today.

OO!

P.S. - The teaser poster for "Sweeney Todd" is on imdb.com. AWESOME - is all I will say about it. If you value your health and sanity, you should check it out. Makes me want to dance around.

...A Petite Fictionalized Non-fiction...

"Cancel my subscription. I'm tired of your issues!" Trina shouted at everyone.

"Enough of this diatribe, I'm moving to Canada to live in a tree house. All the fucking crazy people in the world can leave me the hell alone" she continued.

....And other emphatically howled expressions of anger, frustration, and deepest disgust.....

Snakes in Pain.

God help anyone that would preface a blog this way, but...

When "Snakes on a Plane" was released, there were all these hilarious knock-off shirts with little cartoon snakes performing various actions. "Snakes in the Rain" portrayed a tiny 'S' squiggle with a miniature umbrella, for example. There were also "Snakes in Spain," and my favorites, "Snakes Insane" and "Snakes in Pain" (!). Here was a bitty squiggle with a bandage wrapped around his wee tail.

All this to say, we had a fucking copperhead in our building at work. Yup. There was a poisonous snake hissing and striking at a co-worker in the hallway day before yesterday. Not long before that, we'd had the mother of all rats (which we finally caught in the women's bathroom). This thing was this size of, I don't know, like, a chihuahua, or something.

Right, back to the snake. My rant here is this: I present this copperhead as evidence of the cracked nature of the world I inhabit. How is it that deadly snakes just traipse in and out of here unchecked, and no one thinks it's weird? Certainly it gives me something to think about. Yet I know that if a snake had gotten in to the main office, everyone would've flipped out. But it's okay, here, for everything to be ghetto.

Conditions of my extracirricular activies / employments have always been relatively shanty. In high school we were "The Little Speech Team That Could." In college, we were the undervalued, underappreciated, underfunded (though completely stellar) "Drama Productions Produced Out of Thin Air." And now there are snakes....

I cut out a paper snake and we hung it on the door, a warning to all those who enter, "Beware! Snakes on Premises."

But there is a deadly ending to this serpentine tale of ickiness. The copperhead in question got its head cut off by a snow shovel and is now being eaten by ants. Snakes in Pain indeed....

Random acts of Humor.

I'm about died over this one, promise.

Now listen, the hilarity of this situation simply does not register at the appropriate notch on the "Fun-O-Meter" unless you hear the voice that accompanies the story, but we'll make do for the moment. There's a lady who's been calling into the trading post show we produce for the past several days. And when I say- well, just listen to what she's selling:

"AAAAA --- YYEEEESSSS! (she speaks loudly - and you can tell, even on the phone, that she's speaking in ALL CAPS) - I've got a UNICORRRRNNNNN fer saaaaale. It's got, AAAAA, one horn."

This is not a prank call. It's an older lady. Dead serious.

I'm sitting at my desk, doing my daily updates. I turn to the TV to find the host, live, on-air, hunched over his clipboard, absolutely shaking with laughter. I nearly fall in the floor.

Truly, at this point, my hopes are in the air. A Unicorn! If I was four I would have danced around the room. But being the distinguished twenty-three year old that I am, I remain cautiously optimistic that, indeed, a local personage has gone into the mythical beast wrangling business...

Yet, it was all for naught. As an afterthought, after a moment, I suspect, to reflect on what she has just professed to selling, the lady adds:

"It's, aaaaaa, ceramic, aaaaa, a ceraaamicccc unicoooorrrnn."

Nuts. My dreams are shattered. But again, I try to contain my grief behind a mask of passivity. Perhaps tomorrow.... Now around the office, some say it was that the woman explained that the unicorn only had one horn that made this situation so funny. Others say it was the woman's voice that cinched the humor of it. *I* say it was because this lady called in and said she had a frickin' UNICORN FOR SALE! However, I'll let you decide.

(As a side note, I'll mention that my mother said I should call in to the show the next morning and say that I want to BUY a unicorn, but that I can't take it if it's only got one horn.... :)

Oh! Maybe I've mentioned it. What about the woman who called in and announced to all the viewers out there in TV land that she had, not kidding here folks, "a hairy weiner for sale."

You can't make this up. My life simply CANNOT be this funny. I love it.

Again, I turn from my computer toward the television set in my office to find the show's host barely, *BARELY* supressing laughter. And again, it's only as an afterthought, that this woman adds, "You know, one of those Dachshunds?" Now, invariably, the lady couldn't find the words to express that she had "a long-haired dachshund for sale." Yet, it's the eloquence and beauty (and ambiguity) with which she expressed her desires that made the whole situation so exquisite.

Freud, I believe, would have something to say about this one....

Conversion. Like Metric?

I'm afraid I haven't any humorous antecdotes today. Just frustration and irritaion.

I've been wondering, recently more than usual, what the hell makes my soul so bloody valuable that every effing person from here to Timbuktu is trying to convert me to the path of Jesus. It's like people think they're going to get Brownie Points with God if they can conquer and convert the soul of one Super Mitten. I can't take two steps and spit without hitting a concerned, pious individual who's hell-bent on saving my everlasting soul from the stinging flames of eternal damnation's fires.

For the most part, I try to mind my own business where religion is concerned, keep my religious views and opinions to myself (one of the few subjects, for anyone who knows me, that I remain relatively mum about, unless asked directly). I *try* to be tolerant of others' views, though my patience wears thin, inevitably, when confronted with those wildly fanatical zealots who populate the area.

And it's fine, I feel, to let people know where you stand with regard to religion, politics, whatever. There's nothing better than a sound, intelligent conversation about religion. I love it. But the problem is, people tend (particularly, it seems, where I am concerned) to force-convert you without bothering to find out what you believe in the first place. And apparently I've had "I Worship Satan" tatooed on my forehead since I was five, because since then, my life as been one long string of attempts by concerned do-gooders to reform my troubled umbra.

But in this area (or perhaps in this world) one's religious fraternization, political affiliation, even one's sexual preference seems to be conditional. Who you're speaking to, talking about, looking at, or even thinking of governs which side of the fence you stand on at the moment. That alone is justification, in my book, to avoid jumping into the belly of the churning hypocritical, propaganda endorsing machine running local churches, schools, and perhaps most sadly, governmental organizations. Nevermind the fact that, last time I checked, the person who converts the most troubled souls doesn't get moved to the front of the cosmic/theologic queue at Heaven's Gate (or wherever).

Certainly, I would be ignorant to admonish all this and feign guiltlessness. I sin, like everyone. I'm as big a hypocrite as the next person. I have my vices. (And I love some of them...) And too much, probably, I wear them on my sleeve. Perhaps that's why I'm such an easy target for the "Fanatical Converters" of the world. Or maybe I've just been at the receiving end of an onslaught of conversion recently. Maybe everyone's trying to convert everyone. It's human nature, I 'spose, to try to "convert" those in your sightline toward your POV.

Regardless, I'm just babbling. God save the lunatics....

Hoedowns, Barn-Raisings, & Bar Mitzvahs.

The power of advertising is strong.

Recently, a co-worker asked me to help craft a billboard ad for the local origination channel I produce to announce that his band was accepting bookings for, as he put it, "weddings, reunions, festivals, etc." However, I found this list far too diminutive and limiting to our vast and diverse audience. I asked him why he didn't include other local events on the list. Barbeques, for example. Bar mitzvahs? Hoedowns? For heavens sake, Barn-Raises, at least.

Funny though he found all of this, my co-worker simply refused to allow me to admit Bar Mitzvahs onto the list.

"Co-Worker," I admonished him, "you will certainly isolate the Jewish community of eastern Kentucky if you omit this important event from your list of possible gigs. Surely you see the danger in this?"

Surely, he did not. Bar Mitzvahs were, in fact, omitted. The final list read, "Local Band, Now Accepting Bookings for Reunions, Festivals, Fundraisers (and in small print), Hoedowns, BBQs, Weddings, and Barn Raises."

My glee increased exponentially to the funniness of the aforementioned list. However, as the days passed, my excitement was lessened as not a single effing person called to book the band. Were my days as a booking agent numbered?

Yet, today, a very stoned sounding man called me and said:

"Uh, yeee-aaaah. I saw this band on TV a-wantin' to play fer barn-raisins, er whutever..."

"You want to book the band, sir?"

"Uh, yesss'm, I do."

In the background I hear, "Ask'em about the hoedowns, too!"

Heee Haaaw! Success! Too much fun for words.

Also, on a side note, I would like to add an additional humorous antecdote about my mother.

When I came downstairs yesterday, I found Momma sitting on the couch, reading and eating an ice cream cone. Emboldened, apparently, by the rock'em, sock'em crime book in her hand, she turned to me and said, "If you go to the grocery store this weekend, don't you get me any of those sissy-ass ice cream cones!"

HA! I'd never really heard "sissy-ass" used to describe anything, but coming out of my mother's mouth, it was quite comical.

Renovations...

If there is a crazy person within a three hundred mile radius of where I work, chances are, I'll deal with them at some time or another. On a daily basis, I'm inundated with all manner of psychoses and butchers of the English language. It bothered and disturbed me (briefly) that just about everyone who calls the office is out of their blinking mind. I would never have dreamed that so many individuals desirous of selling their lawn care equipment (or whatever miscellaneous accoutrements are enqueued today) could be so nutty.

If one man isn't daily calling to harrass me about putting on his personal and profound profession of love to his married girlfriend --you know, enduring love, the kind that lasts "always and forever"-- then I simply can't call it a normal day at work. I've wondered, more than a few times, if eveyrone on earth is crazy - or maybe it's just me. Possibly. Probably both. But with zonked out women calling in to tell me that I just don't understand drug use until I've stuck needles in my arms and had bloody noses from all the coke I've done (which is her rationale for needing to be on television), I'm beginning to think that perhaps everyone else is nuts, not just me.

My tirade was set off today by an incident that had me in tears laughing. A man called to tell me that he needed to "renovate a house for a week for his parents." "Renovate?" I asked.

"Yeah," he anwered. "They're comin' to town next week and they need a place to stay, so we're lookin' for a place they can renovate."

Meanwhile, in the background, I hear a woman, presumabley the man's wife, hissing, "Rent, RENT, the word is RENT!"

To which the man I'm speaking with covers the mouthpiece and hisses back,
"I KNOW it's rent! What do you think renovate MEANS?"

BAAAAHHH! I haven't had that good of a laugh for about three months. Children.

I decided that henceforth, all such zany instances shall be recorded, if not simply for that fact that one day I'll put all this junk in a book and will need to remember it, but also because it's just fucking funny....

Ruminations, speculations, & meditations.

Ah. New York. It was divine.

Kevin Spacey ....was divine.... And beautiful.

Additionally, there exist in this world remarkable individuals who stand always against stupidity and injustice in their exceptionally gentle and patient way. Bless you. Continue to fight the good fight.

Furthermore, thank God for the fucking Fratellis.

Stay tuned and other cryptic nonsense.

42.

Lettuce Dream.

Hello, My Treacherous Friends.

What's with the onslaught of completely random and disturbing dreams? Last night Amber was absorbed in eating spaghetti with tweezers.

Valentine's Day is nearly upon us. Lettuce tear our hair. Lettuce pray. Lettuce riot. Lettuce avoid the bad puns and not give this day the recognition it does not deserve by never mentioning it again.

"It is a mistake to think you can solve any major problems just with potatoes." --Douglas Adams

Perception.

I realized last night that I define myself by the negative opinions of the most horrible people I've encountered in my life. I've dwelled entirely too much on how that petty girl said "......" about me that one time, or how so and so lied to me and used me.You can see how shitty my view of myself is.

Yet I found myself in an unusual and unlikely situation a few days ago in which I voluntarily attended a lunch function hosted by an uppity local church. Now I've had horrible experiences with just about everyone and everything associated with this church from the time I entered kindergarten. (According to them, I worshipped Satan and was headed straight for Hell if I didn't join their band of miscreant Worship Warriors, on a mission ordained by God to save, apparently, my damned soul.) The pastor spent half of lunch preaching about hypocrisy and how we should all slough extraneous factors from our religious lives. Insert obvious remark here.

Having voluntarily attended this function with a coworker, I vowed to remain indifferent, polite, and open-minded in the face of a group of people who have for so many years collectively and individually treated my like shit. Worse than shit. It was then that it occurred to me that in my mind, I'm not defined by the people who love me, and who daily extoll my virtues, beauties, and talents. I blindly see myself through the lens of jilted former friends, spiteful, indifferent, and ignorant "enemies," and shithead ex-flings and 'boy' friends.

It is truly no wonder I'm so hard on myself. Jeeez-uz.

EEE!

I'm going to New York!

EEEE!!!

A Faun, a Dream, a Bunch of Crazies.

Will I get to rent "The Science of Sleep"? Doubtful. I think I'm going to have to break down and invest. It's Michel Gondry. Should be worth the expenditure. Meanwhile, "Running With Scissors" is available for purchase today. (Someone really should hire me to promote their films...) I recommend this movie from the bottom of my toes. It disturbed me for days. It made me appreciate and forgive my family's minor idiocyncracies. It compelled me to bathe and scrub my house.

The main event, however, is "Pan's Labyrinth." I journeyed far to watch it, and still haven't figured out how I feel about it. I'm not exaggerating in the slightest when I say I was hopping up and down with excitement. (I'm such a dork, I'm taken aback by it at times.) But I think the film landed a bit too close to home in parts, which is probably why I was so pissed when I left the theatre. Don't get me wrong: It was good. It was really good. But I don't know that it was twenty-two minutes of applause good (as apparently the folks at Cannes thought). The Pale Man was creepy as all hell. Pan was deviously askew... had crazy, square goat eyes. Worth the expedition, for sure.

I dreamed last night that I drilled screws into my teeth.

Listen to Mika. Really. Do.

Forgive Me: My voice is an Echo.

Record, Trina, record.

I love my job. The End. I dreaded looking for one, I hem-hawed around, panicked, and, somehow (and I'm pretty sure God was involved in this one), I've stumbled upon a Cave of Wonders and found myself at a terricic place. I like the work here, I'm (I think) good at it, and there's room for me to get involved creatively in the company, which is what I want.
I don't dread getting up in the morning; I look forward to coming to work. I can honestly say that for the duration of my school career, I woke up with dread every morning of my life. It was always stress and very little pleasure. People see me as panicked, stressed, too serious, too focused, too intense. But that's just not a complete picture of me. That's a picture of me in a school environment. And it's the worst version of me. It's the version of me that I HATE. I've been "enduring" school, waiting for my release so I could go out and BEGIN my life. (This is, of course, a completely incorrect way to look at the world, but that's the illogic of Trina in a school setting.) Now, freed of the stress I associated with school, I feel like I can grow. And that makes me happy.

The problem is, School Trina is the only version of myself I know anymore. I've been immersed in this world of stress for so long, I can barely find remnants of any other Trinas suffocating beneath the panic defense mechanisms. I'm still falling back on panic when something new comes along, instead of looking at challenges for what they are: challenges. It doesn't have to be stress, it can be exciting.

So with this "problem," I've found myself in the position of not knowing who I am. Generic? Yes. Cliche? Absolutely. My voice is an echo of so many others who set about "looking for themselves." But I simply do NOT want to be Panic Trina anymore. I want to be the "Real Trina" that's trying to immerge out of all this rubble. I hope I like me.

My first order of business is to "Forgive Me." Everyone tells me I'm too hard on myself. I am.
I'm okay. Whoever I turn out to be.