I keep getting questions about the VS fashion show and the reactions on the interwebz to it. I wrote a post about the show in general here but seeing the reactions on the internet is amazing. I only saw two pieces, Maroon 5 performing and Nicki Minaj performing. Adam walking with Anne up the runway was super adorable and romantic and you have to give those girls props for walking a glitter runway in those shoes.

Anyway, the reactions. I was appalled by how many people said things along the lines of ‘these girls are fake as fuck’ or the flipside ‘Nicki Minaj looks like an oompa loompa next to the models.’ Both are terrible and mostly said by women because we just love to hate on other women. Holy shit girls. We should be working together for a better tomorrow for our younger, female generations instead of constantly tearing each other down.

Are the angels bodies insane? Yes. Is it likely that they look like that all the time? No. Do they achieve that in an unhealthy manner? Who knows, it’s arguable. Are you supposed to look like them? Absolutely not. That doesn’t make them fake. They aren’t cyborgs from a super sexy planet. It’s their job. Just because your boyfriend/girlfriend thinks they’re hot, that doesn’t mean they expect you to look like them. You think Chris Evans is hot but you don’t expect your boyfriend to look like that and you don’t love him any less for looking like, you know, an average guy.

Then to slam Nicki for not being a 6 foot tall supermodel is ridiculous. This girl has a platinum record and her career is unfuckingbelievable. She’s achieved things most pop stars can’t dream of, but we’re insulting her because she doesn’t look like the models, which isn’t even her job? That’s amazing and disgusting. She isn’t any less sexy just because she’s standing next to an angel. She’s still an absolute hot ass that screams sex.

The only way to make a better tomorrow for girls is to stop fighting and bitching and bickering because we’re all so god damn insecure. If you were perfectly happy with your body, you wouldn’t be cutting other women down.

I only know how to laugh in inappropriate situations

If it's a place (funeral home, OBgyn office, children's play) or a situation (sex, conversations with my strict grandmother, awkward yoga poses) I will laugh during it.

I don't know why, as I don't have the nervous laughter issue. My nervous defense mechanism is to be silent, which just makes me look like a total weirdo pulling a Harpo Marx at the bar while I stare at my feet. But I just think laughter is always appropriate and makes the world a better place.

We take ourselves far too seriously. If I have to go to the chiropractor because I have a sex injury (true story) I'm going to laugh. If I see a St. Bernard hump a toddler (mostly true story) I'm going to almost pee my pants laughing. If I'm having sex and I'm having a good time, I'll laugh. Apparently, guys might take offense to this. They don't get that I'm not laughing at them (usually) but just having fun. Or I'm being tickled. As I've been told, this is not normal. When I asked my friend if she laughs during sex she was all, 'yeah, if we're trying out a weird new position,' and I'm all, 'yeah, but I laugh all the time.' Then she looked at me like a freak. I get this look often. Shouldn't sex be fun? What's wrong with expressing that you're having a good time? I have had exactly one person get mad at me for laughing during sex, and that was the boyfriend of 5 years which I am no longer with. Probably because I laugh during sex. Is this not normal?

Maybe it's because, since I was young, I've never had a firm grasp on appropriateness. I thought scaling a chain link fence in my new skirt was appropriate. I also thought yanking flowers, root and all, from my neighbors to give to my mom was appropriate. Who knew?

I lie about the stupidest shit

It's never anything cool. I don't tell people I'm a ninja (not like that's a lie) or even anything that would make me look more like a classy lady - I don't swear, I can't eat an entire large pizza alone, I don't serenade my loved ones to off-key classic rock ballads on a regular basis.

No, it's always about the stupid little things that will somehow come back to bite you in the ass. In bed last Saturday, for some reason, instead of saying something cool like, yeah, I'm a four time Olympic gold gymnast, I told the guy I was with that feet freak me out. Oh, context? Don't worry, he wasn't shoving his feet in my face or anything. You would have seen me running down Atwells at 4 a.m. I probably should have used a lie when he told me he wanted to stay up with me all night. Then, I should have dropped a lie so it seemed like I didn't have massive insomnia problems and had been awake for 48 hours already and might fall asleep mid naked happy baby pose. Instead, as I was flopped down on the bottom of the bed, turned around wrong-ways - not for some fun, previously unknown sex move, but because I wanted to see if the room looked any different from this angle (it doesn't) - he grabbed my feet and for some reason I said, 'motherfucker, feet freak me out.'

This isn't entirely true. I don't mind my own feet. They're somewhat freakishly small which makes shoe buying shitty because they only ever have a few pairs of size six. I don't have finger toes or bunions or webbed toes. I had a cute pedicure and everything. But I'm compelled to lie for no reason on a regular basis.

And it's stuff like this that will come back and bite me in the ass. Somehow, this will be the guy I marry, and he'll forever think feet freak me out. We'll have to always wear our shoes in the house. I'll never get a foot rub again. I'll have to sneak off to get pedicures and never get to see them because of the previously aforementioned always wear shoes in the house rule.

From now on, I'm thinking of cool lies. I'm an FBI informant in the witness protection program. I swam the English Channel (is that far?). I have a house in the Alps that I usually reside in so you'll probably never see me again after tonight. That blonde walking down Bolyston? Not me. Totally my cyborg twin from the witness protection program. Who else here has lied about stupid shit and it's come back to bite you? Don't lie to me. I know it has. 

How to get happy: This is not your mother's self-help book

I’m in the airport with a delayed flight and I’ve circled the little store hocking Orlando themed everything - from shot glasses to baby bibs - when I see this book. It’s all about how to be happy.

Now, I personally have posted a list about this. It included accepting your nerdy side, dancing, and taking mental health days from school or work. I consider myself an optimistic, happy person. Some may even say bubbly. But these lists have lots of things other than what I listed. Maybe mine was too basic. Maybe it was too naïve. So I grab my blackberry (though apparently unplugging is one step to happiness) and google ‘how to be happy.’ The results are extensive. I should go completely green. Grow my career. Stop worrying about my career and find happiness at my job. Clean out my apartment. Throw away everything I wouldn’t take with me if I moved. Have dinners with friends. Save the whales. Rescue puppies. Focus on others. Focus on me. Focus on family. Be independent. Share my problems. Eat clean. Eat some candy. Cut out coffee. Have more chocolate. Lose 10 pounds. Stop dieting. Exercise.

As I’m scanning these, I’m wedged in a tiny airport seat, ignoring the view of the sun climbing through the clouds and planes lining up to shuffle all these cranky passengers on. Kids are screaming around me. There is a waltz I haven’t heard since I played violin in high school streaming into the terminal. Tom and Jerry is on TV (have I mentioned I hate children’s shows?) and my brother has his 6'4 frame curled up to sleep on the floor. I impulse purchased Reese’s Pieces for breakfast and a best selling novel that was just made into a movie. Sarah Jessica Parker stares up at me from the cover. I try to think of what a classy lady like herself would do in this position. Probably not whine about the delays, glare at the screaming children, or complain about the television.

So maybe I’m not as happy as I thought. Maybe I take my optimism for granted instead of cultivating it. Or maybe it’s all bullshit. I’m going to find out. I’m going to compile these lists and try every step - one a week - and see if I am a radically changed person. Maybe I’ll even blog about it here, or add a blog, so you can read about my experience and pick and choose which steps you’d like to use and which to skip. Maybe they all suck. Maybe I’m just being stuck up and they’ll all work. I’m willing to find out. When I post the steps, feel free to try them out and share your experiences. Let’s make a happier tomorrow. Or all waste our time trying. What do we have to lose?

In Defense of Food

Cross post all the things!

I hear a lot of talk about moderation on holidays, and about how sad it is that so many cultures are focused around food, but I’m not on board with that.

I believe in sitting around the table on Thanksgiving, eating good food, and not worrying about the calories. I believe in congregating in the kitchen and picking at the raw cookie dough on Christmas Eve. I believe in going out to lunch with your girlfriends at your favorite Mexican restaurant, or finding your favorite cupcake at the local bakery. I believe that when you go to your Italian grandmother’s house who will chase you around the house with a wooden spoon if you don’t eat enough, you should try her damned spaghetti, because it’s probably the best you’ll ever have. I believe in renting horror movies and making a fort out of blankets to eat popcorn and nachos in with your significant other.

We are not bodybuilders. We aren’t in competition. We can have a freaking slice of birthday cake that our friend slaved over for her son. No, you don’t need to eat a plate of grandma’s spaghetti the size of your head, but you shouldn’t beat yourself up for having a decent portion.

Food should not be the enemy. Eat well. Eat healthy. When you indulge yourself, do it right. Don’t eat six twinkies, buy one of those ridiculously expensive cupcakes from the gourmet place in your city. When you’re going nuts from eating raw spinach for two weeks straight, have a really awesome, authentic Japanese dinner and pay far too much money for it instead of diving into a bag of Doritos.

Have fun with food. It does mean a lot to many cultures, and there’s no need to be afraid of it or to break that tradition. Pass down recipes. Have a whipped cream eating contest with your niece. Attempt to make your aunt’s great apple pie, burn it three times, and feed the remains to the dog. But when you get it right, don’t just put it on the table and insist that everyone else eat it. Have a slice yourself.

Stop being scared and stop limiting yourself. Be a food snob. Insist on ordering the most expensive chocolate cake, then enjoy every single bite, or split it with your best friend. I promise you will not go up a dress size from it.

Why does anyone like me?

I seem confident on my tumblr, right? I give lots of advice. You guys basically trust me to give you a stable point of view on your major life decisions.


That by no means makes me perfect, or even means that I have my shit figured out. You all ask about boys and girls, relationships, and crushes. Do they like you, do you like them? It's all that lovely abstract bullshit that will never have a definitive answer for, but I'll give you my best third party opinion. But even the most stable, levelheaded people will find themselves asking, 'why the hell would anyone like me?' (If you think I'm a stable, levelheaded person, you clearly don't know me in real life - not like I once tried to scale a wrought iron fence and got stuck half way in an attempt to spy on a hot guy when I was twelve).


I ask this often: with my girlfriends over my lunch, with my girlfriends when we're out dancing, with my girlfriends when I run into them on a walk of shame, and they all share the same confusion about themselves. What makes guys have any interest in us? Don't they understand that we're fucking crazy? This is usually asked after a wine fueled, extremely unsexy underwear dance, sometimes including a tophat, as we're getting ready to go out. Mid pelvic thrusting to Feel Like Making Love, we'll stop and realize that there are guys who are going to attempt to take us home tonight, and they have no idea how tapped we are.


We've decided that I trick people into thinking I'm hot with my Barbie blond hair and fantastic boobs. When I go out with my best friend, we are like an optical illusion. Both small, about the same height, one bright blonde, one mysterious brunette, and guys love it. They have no idea that we were car dancing to Baby Got Back on the ride over.


A guy might sleep with me, but if we turn it into a routine, I will grow perpetually more and more worried that he will eventually see the real me. Some day, he'll figure out that my little quips about his ego or the fact that I can open the condom wrapper myself, dammit, are all signs of my deep seated feminism that will drive a guy right over the edge. I can be cutting and witty in bed, but he will eventually figure out that I'm borderline bitchy on a regular basis and that glare he gets when he puts his huge, super-hot, personal trainer hands on my head as I go down on him is the same one he'll some day get when he puts my plates in the wrong cabinet.


I hit the gym a lot and my idea of a great date is hiking followed up by rock climbing, but I take forever at the gym because I constantly stop to dance to my workout playlist. And by workout playlist, I mean everything Lady Gaga has ever put out. I am a terrible running partner. I am a supportive teammate but I don't take competition seriously at all.


I am difficult to the point of impossibility, and my hair and high heels will not compensate for that forever. But for now, it will get me in the bar for free and get many drinks bought for me. Too bad I embarked on a sober journey last year.


For now, I'll pretend to be wildly mysterious when in reality, I'm just extremely weird and will probably spend the majority of my life tethered to this computer, talking to all of you and ignoring the hot dude in my bed. Go away, buddy, I'm busy here.