Feb 25
My parents asked what I wanted for my birthday. After arguing with my mom that I don’t need anything she finally got me to say, “OK OK, how about some bedding?” I picked it out online and sent the links to my pops. My dad’s reply was, “Your bed is going to look like Candyland!”
I said, “I KNOW, it’s going to be glorious!”
I have a thing for bright colors. Can you tell? Rupert approves of it as well. He popped up on the duvet just in time for Caturday.
Feb 18
Rupert likes to sit with me when I put on makeup. He kept staring at me while I was combing my bangs so of course, this happened…
Feb 12
When I was a kid I loved the crap out of this video. My cousin had it on VHS after we stayed up taping MTV one weekend and she made me a copy. When I was 12 my Aunt had me visit her, my cousin and her husband in Denver. While I was there she took me to Whitney Houston’s concert which was during the whole Bodyguard movie and soundtrack craze. The show was amazing. We had second row seats and the dancers were right in front of us. As a tween this was a crazy fun experience for me. My aunt got us backstage so we could have Whitney sign our programs. But she never showed up after an hour of us and a room of other people waiting for her. Finally her manager came out and said she was “too exhausted” to come for a meet and greet. But Bobby Brown and his entourage showed up and THEY signed our programs. At the time I had no idea who Bobby was and I remember when I asked my aunt she said, “I think he did that ‘Get out of my dreams get into my car’ song.”
My aunt thought Bobby Brown was Billy Ocean. Ahaha. Oh Whitney, I hope you can finally get some rest.
Nov 24
Last month I was scrambling to fill the room for rent in my apartment. One roommate was leaving and I needed a new person to fill the spot. October proved to be a month filled with crazy parades and nutbag sundaes. Because let me just say, Craigslist isn’t having a shortage on the mentally damaged, ill or homeless person looking for a room to rent. I’m pretty sure I met at least 96% of them in October 10-27th. On Halloween I met one person I suspect is a drug dealer who later drunk dialed me twice. Leaving me voicemails like, “Girl, where u at? Thisyaboyjussssssblarhahahggghhh.” And on Halloween I ALSO met the dude I came here to talk about. He came to my house at 1:30pm and did not leave until after dark, after hours. After “I’ll leave right after this cigarette” statements and about five cigs later..
So this guy, who I can only pray isn’t the stalker type and reading this. Because nice as he may be, the entire experience was bizarre and uncomfortable at best. He basically came to my apartment to see if it would suit his rental needs, right? RIGHT. Well, he didn’t LEAVE for hours. It was DAYTIME when he arrived and nighttime when he left. NIGHT TIME. That’s just weird. But the thing was that was so uncomfortable, besides how frank and personal the topics he talked about were, was that I couldn’t shake him. I kept saying I needed to see other people, or go, or WHATEVER, but he would just keep talking and talking. We had a ton in common, but as he kept talking I realized he was shooting down everything I said with an argument. And then he was just projecting, not even looking at me sometimes. As if giving a speech to a crowd. He was TALKING AT ME for HOURS. I felt like I was trapped with some crazy man who knew way too much about siamese cats and Battlestar Galactica.
Come to find out, he was homeless. Like, living at a Motel 6 and the JC library homeless. So now I feel horrible. I know the building won’t rent to this dude, he’s super shadey as it is, and honestly I didn’t WANT to live with him. I mean, I would never be able to talk to him. He would just set up a podium in the livingroom and put on lectures about which pizza crust was invented by which group of people in which time and BLAHBLAHBLAH…So he wasn’t leaving probably because he didn’t have anywhere to GO until work. I know he was on foot and was leaving for work when he finally did leave after that “one last cigarette” in the sunroom. After he left I remember dead bolting the door and thinking to myself, “What the fuck just HAPPENED!?”
It took me a good day of thinking about the experience to even decompress or figure out the little tidbits about how he was really just talking at me for 5 hours. How he had no sense of boundaries. How he made me uncomfortable and was just a WEE BIT creepy. He told me everything from how often he shaves his balls to his thoughts on tantric self-sex?!?! Also, he pulled up his shirt to expose his stomach for way longer than needed. Saw that I wasn’t looking at him, avoiding contact with him, and that I was uncomfortable. So THEN he put his shirt down. He played it off like, “I just wanna prove a point, I got a belly on me.” YES, THANK YOU, I SEE THAT. A VERY LARGE HAIRY BELLY, NICE, PLEASE KEEP YOUR SHIRT UP LONGER, SIR.
A couple days pass. I tell him I’m renting to someone else (I’ve found the current roommate I have now by then, as he was my interview the next day and we just got along better). He asks if I want to hang out some time. I am taken aback because I remember when he finally left on Halloween he said he wanted to “hang out again.” Which what went on in my head was more like, “OH GREAT, he wants to talk at me and correct me for many hours again. How fantastic.” I said that basic, “Yeah, sure, totally. I’ll let you know.” Like a real California bitch, right?
I figured at this point that the hint was carried and received, processed and shredded. That in his emotional mind I was like, totally off the radar and forgotten. OH HOW WRONG, DEVIN. He called about 3 times. Left about 4 voicemails. Only talked in a couple, the others were that breathing hang up when they realize it’s VM that every girl loves hearing 4 of a row of in her inbox.
When I didn’t answer those calls or call him I figured by now it was obvious. Surely, the message was NOW apparent and had been sent through. Pony at the station, etc. etc. Nope. He waited until Friday night. I was already in bed when he tried. Private number first, then his cell, then private. That was it, he didn’t try again.
It is now two days after that. I am on my way to an appointment downtown. As I hit a red light who should be crossing the street at that precise moment but CLINGWRAP.
My body went movie-scape. I was plunked into Pulp Fiction. I felt this ice water chill rumble through my whole gut and down my back. I was watching his face, watching the movement of his body. Frozen and just watching for him to turn his face just the tiniest bit and make eye contact with me. I was expecting a full rehashing of the movie. He locks eyes with me and simply says, “Mother fucker.”
There would be a horrible alley chase. Horrible not because it ends in the gun shop but because I hate running. And then yeah, obviously I’m not super thrilled about the whole gimp idea.
BUT! Apparently I was super peachy in another life. Because at the exact moment when his face was turning–turning right to SEE ME–a gust of wind hit his face and moving his scarf. Moving his attention from what would have been my car, my eyes, my face and sending his field of vision away from me onto the curb and his coat. The light was green, he was across the street fumbling with his scarf now, I was no longer frozen and I took off.
Santa Rosa is just like every other small town. Too small.
But I did. Marie Claire’s editor to be exact in response to Maura Kelly’s fat-hate blog on their website. I so rarely do this, but I couldn’t hold it in. I pay for that stupid magazine and have since I was a teen!:
A big fat complaint and full-figured disappointment
As a Marie Claire subscriber and frequenter of your website I was pretty taken aback by Maura Kelly’s blog entry and obvious disgust over the ‘fatty’ population. I am a fat chick and I don’t use euphemisms like Big-boned or Plus-sized. I say fat. I’m not part of the movement for acceptance of fat people, nor do I boldly hold pride in my frame. I’m just a normal 30 year old woman who eats too much when I’m stressed or sad, isn’t so happy about my weight in general, but also realizes how many awesome qualities I have to balance me out into one cool (fat) chick.
I am all for articles and blogs on the sad state of our American people today when it comes to being overweight. And I’ve even told people your magazine was ‘different’ than most because I remember it being one of the FIRST I’d seen some years back that featured plus sized models and options for shopping for a fuller figured gal. At the time, I remember being shocked and glad, SMILING over something so simple but so huge for a magazine. And now here I am, ready to cancel a subscription to a magazine I’ve read some 15+ years now over a blog entry. That seems rash, but sometimes people in high places put their foot too far into their mouths for me to let them take it back. Maura Kelly did that for me. I just wish she could have held off on this one. Post something so obviously hate fueled and apparent with her word use for a livejournal that only friends can see or a personal notepad, anything but a magazine’s million-read blog! I kelly THOUGHT before typing how disgusted she is seeing a person like me walk down the street. A person like me. A person who buys her magazine and pays her salary and maybe, PROBABLY, quite possibly might find that language offensive and hurtful. Just a thought, that’s all I’m askin. One or two before hitting that publish button.
Subscriber and first time writer to your publication,
Devin O’Shaughnessy, California
Jul 5
Eating Bing cherries I bought for a dollar a bag on the Petaluma Hill roadside. They are sweet and firm and perfect for this weather. I’m listening to the music coming from the 4th of July fairgrounds band sets. I have a perfect view of the fireworks tonight outside my upstairs apartment. The band is currently playing “Beat It.” The neighbors downstairs are BBQing and squirting each other with orange plastic squirt guns. One of the ladies seated directly below my window (her outside patio is below me) is singing along to the music from the fair. She just keeps saying “Beat it, Beat it” over and over with no tune or melody, just the words, “beat it, beat it…”
The youngest teen girl keeps shrieking every time the water hits her hair from one of her brother’s guns. I’m tempted to scream, “IT’S JUST WATER, YOU ARE MAKING MY EARS BLEED!” But I don’t want them to hate me. Even though I would be some mysterious voice booming from a window above. That girl has a future in scream work.
Jul 4
My whole friendship with D-Rock came to a head today. I never talk about him, but he’s a leftover of the art class kids. Garfunkel is long gone along with little Mags. But D-Rock, I could see this coming.
He brought over Honey Moon beers for me because he knows I love Blue Moon with oranges. It’s delicious but he thought that bringing me 12 beers (to share, obviously) meant I would somehow get drunk enough to want to bone him? Uhm, no.
You know those dudes who when you think you’ve made your “friends only” idea clear with someone and they consistently tap at the door over and over again until they either break it down or finally just go away? That’s this guy. Today he decided to break it down and I wanted to break HIS ASS DOWN.
Well not really, because I am a wimp. But I told him that he was making me feel awkward. He got the hint and backed off a little. It got really quiet and weird. He tried to talk about art. Asking what was I painting as he grabbed my hand to see the paint colors left on my nails from working on mom’s birthday present. It felt weird and I pulled my hand back a little too fast. I could see it hurt his feelings just by the way his eyes brows moved over his eyes. He has pretty eyes, but pretty eyes do not delete all the other things about him..
He’s too young, he’s a bum, he lives with his parents, and I’m pretty much 80% sure he’s a secret alcoholic. So no more D-Rock.
I could tell by the way he hugged me goodbye that he probably knows I’m done. He tried calling a minute ago and when I didn’t pick up he didn’t leave a voicemail (he always, always does).
Yeah, he knows.
Jul 2
We talked about the characters Skids and Mudflap from the second Transformers movie in my Race and Ethnic studies soc class. I haven’t SEEN the movie, but just the description and picture alone (along with classmates describing them) was ridiculous to me. A GOLD TOOTH AND CURLY HAIR? REALLY? The point I brought up too was that they are supposed to be SPACE ALIEN ROBOTS. How would they have any concept of black American stereotypes or rap music? Anyway, I can get why some people find it offensive.
We have been covering each minority group with a special class focus on specific peoples with a study of a timeline, keys dates and a video and viewing guide. We studied Native Americans on Tues and then African Americans Weds, which is when this robot issue came up.
The video we watched on Native Americans was especially depressing. Monday is no class for the holiday, but Tuesday we talk about Chinese Americans. Considering all the horrible crap they went through after we basically told them, “COME TO AMERICA, BUILD OUR RAILROADS!” and then dumped them as soon as the rails were finished. And that there are specific TERMS like Sinophobia (a fear of anything to do with China) from the history surrounding Chinese relations I can only imagine the video and discussion we have on Tuesday is going to be depressing as well.
This class has definitely stirred up emotions. The two overtly racist acting people that said some insane stuff during class have dropped. They didn’t show up for Monday’s test and I definitely sighed happily. Things are much calmer feeling in that class now. I would be lying if I didn’t say I actually DREADED seeing one of the guys from class. He actually scoffed my smile after class one day because I dared to disagree with his “those people” scenario. He was saying that “those people” shouldn’t be getting handouts. And “those people” use the system and abuse OUR HARD EARNED TAX DOLLARS (hurr durr). It was basically like the episode of South Park when all the hillbillies scream, “THEY’RE TAKIN OUR JERBBBSSS!”
I wanted to punch that guy right in his shitty Celtic knot armband tattoo for even SAYING THE WORDS “THOSE PEOPLE” in a class of such mixed races and cultural backgrounds. All the kids I sit by turned and talked to me after he’d said that. We get a break each class and that class break was especially interesting. We just shook our heads and said under our breath, “Does this guy realize we ARE THOSE PEOPLE!?”
C’est la vie, jerk. I hope you got a W for dropping.
Jun 29
I am HOME. I was the first one done with my test and got the f out of there. I’ve done that as long as I can remember. I remember my dad and sister always did the same thing regarding tests.
While I was waiting for class a security guard on campus talked to me for a long chunk. He told me the fire happening right now (that they just put out, but caused insane traffic on the 101, which I experienced) is suspected arson. And then he told me how his fire buddies tell him about arsonists going back to the scene of their crimes to masturbate. I told him I’d read that in a criminology book, that pyros are known to get sexual thrills from their blazes. He said he’s seen a lot of things in his 20 years.
The thing that cracked me up about him is that he is like an exact replicant of the guy who plays a security guard on that horrendous Yes Dear show. Back in the dark ages when Shannon and I lived together, she would force me to watch that shit with her. And now I am seeing the characters in REAL LIFE. I hope that show was canceled because I still hold ill feelings in my soul towards it.
I went to starbucks since it’s 9000 degrees and got a raspberry passion tea. At the turn towards farmer’s lane two guys in the car across from me made kissy sounds and “grabbing” fingers at me when I looked over at them. Two older than 40 year old gentlemen with 1980′s trucker hats on. I just cracked up because I had no idea how else to respond to that. I tried to ignore them but could still hear the sloppy wet smooching sounds in the wind as my car turned away from them.
When I got upstairs and in the apt, I went to turn on my AC box above my desk. In doing so, I knocked my starbucks tea with my hip and all over the desk and floor. It was like a murder scene of red juice. I was pretty sad about that. The universe just doesn’t want me to have sugar today.
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