I Want to Rock the Hair Dye with You...

I have such exciting hair news!

I always feel bad for the five men who read this blog when I talk about my hair.

That was a poorly constructed sentence.

When I talk about my hair, I always feel bad for the five men who read this blog. There.

Actually, three of the men who I know read this are gay, so the hair talk is probably fine. ...No. My uncle is not gay that way. He is no fun at all, and should just go ahead and spit and scratch and like women, because there is NO celebrity gossip, NO decorating advice and CERTAINLY no hair interest. He is forever emailing me articles on the state of the world and cerebral crap like that.

Every time he sends me one of those dull articles from The New York Times or wherever, I make it a point to forward him an article on Tori Spelling.

So, straight and uninterested gay men, I apologize. Now I must get into the hair talk.

My lovely roots were showing again, although I have to tell you that it took longer than usual thanks to my Aunt Mary sending me that John Freida hair glaze stuff. I'll bet I got a good two weeks without dying out of that stuff. That was another poorly constructed sentence.

So last night we went to the store so I could get me some dye. Now, let me tell you what's beginning to happen. It is starting to be that we can go NOWHERE without knowing someone. We saw two of Marvin's coworkers at the grocery store the other night, and then last night I'm all loaded up on the hair dye and I hear Marvin go, "Hey!"

I met the nicest couple, the woman being another teacher at Marvin's school. Turns out the man likes Michael Jackson, and I have probably failed to mention that Marvin Gardens worked for Michael Jackson for a few years. Somehow Marvin had already MENTIONED this to his entire school, and the woman had already told her husband, and then lo and behold there we all were at the drug store.

Well, Michael Jackson wasn't.

Now, I understand that this occasion could not have been any less about me. Everyone was kind of focused on Marvin and his brush with "greatness." (He insists that Michael Jackson is not a child molester, by the way. Maybe I'll have him do a guest post, if y'all are so inclined.) But I could not help but be terribly conscious of the fact that I had not one, but TWO boxes of hair dye in my hands. "Hi! I am a fake, tarted-up woman! Got any push-up bras up in here? How about press-on nails? Any press-on nails? Do they sell grilles for your teeth in that aisle down there? And hey, where can I get my weave worked on?"

I don't know. It was just weird. I wish I had been holding something respectable, like hand towels and Lysol.

At any rate, I used an EVEN CHEAPER hair dye than before: Revlon. (I used to use L'Oreal.) AND I went crazy and bought one box of medium brown and one box of medium auburn, so I got a really dark red color that is decidedly not burgundy. Which I wanted to avoid. It just doesn't look good with my grille.

So the good news is it turned out really great! I think each box of dye cost less than $3. Now, do not get me wrong. When my year is up, I am SO going back to highlights, lowlights, light my fire, light my fanny and call me Harry, whatever. But for now I am quite pleased.

And to my uncle, next time we will discuss the primaries and the national debt, I promise.

Seventy-six (trom)bones

I just deleted the "Amount We Have Saved This Year" section at right. I deleted it because we are going DOWN, folks, DOWN.

I am trying to remember what we'd saved at our peak. I want to say it was like $18,000. But does anyone remember for sure?

Anyway, now to our name we have $7,631.88. I had to pay a gigantic COBRA payment, and I don't even like snakes, and this move cost more than I thought. Plus, we are living on nearly $100,000 less than we were at the beginning of the year. So into savings we dipped.

I know I should look on the bright side. If we hadn't gone this year without spending, we'd have NO savings whatsoever, which is pretty much what we had the other nine years of our marriage. We always had like $500 or maybe a big $1,000 saved. Which as a dual-income couple with no children was inexcusable! You know it was.

So, nearly eight thousand bucks is actually pretty exciting. As long as we can LEAVE IT ALONE from here on out. Which we may not be able to do, actually.

We are living with one car, and it is not pretty. It is, in fact, ugly. For example, my one outing I have is my volunteer work at the assisted living facility. I can't walk there (I tried to chose a place I could walk to but I accidentally picked a place more than three miles away, through a terrible neighborhood. Oops.), so I have to wait, hovering, like a spider, when Marvin gets home from school. He usually gets home after 4:00, so I LEAP into the car and TEAR over to the home to play this book on tape for Miss Lilly, a blind woman. I have to get there with enough time to play the tape before dinner, which is at 5:00.

So remember how I sold my VW Bug to my mother? Turns out she is not happy with it and wants to sell it, so she is willing to sell it back to us, at whatever monthly payment we can afford. We are thinking about it, trust me.

I know that buying a CAR certainly counts as SPENDING, though. And we are trying to be really really really really strict on our policy now. Even if I did buy some red velvet creme-filled Bingles at the grocery store last night, which I do not think is a cheat, as the rule is we can only buy what we could not make ourselves, and I assure you I do not know how to make red velvet creme-filled Bingles. But OLD June, beginning-of-the-year June, would not have allowed it.

And one more thing. I really have to remember that I did not do this year of no spending in order to save money. In fact, I sincerely thought we were living within our means and that we would save nothing. So having ANY money saved is a PLUS. The POINT was to see what would HAPPEN if we didn't spend. That was it! So, maybe I should get over myself. $7,631.88 will still garner me a lot of Hello Kitty necklaces at year's end.

I hope this song won't end soon

BOOM, fall is here. On Friday, the weather was as it has been since we got here on August 5th. Hot, slow, syrupy, thick. At night was the deafening chirp of nine million June bugs, which we could hear loud and clear because we slept with the bedroom window wide open and there's a tree less than a foot away.

But sometime Friday night, it got chilly. And Saturday had a definite... lightness to it. Last night we closed the window, and all that was out there were a few hagged-out crickets.

Then tonight? When we went on our walk? I had to wear my zip-up sweatshirt. And you had to kind of walk fast at first, so you wouldn't feel too chilly.

Who knows? Maybe it'll warm up again, but it feels fall-y out there now. Which is exciting for me, because I have not experienced a seasonal change since I wore long underwear as fashionable tights under cutoffs.

I moved to LA in early 1997, and I was in Seattle before that, which definitely had a change of seasons. But it's been 15 years since I lived in the land of seasons. The land known as Michigan.

Autumn to me feels so...retro. Maybe I should start wearing bodysuits again. Or not.

Today I am immensely grateful for my friends; those who have stuck with me this year even though they have not gotten any gifts, and those I have made this year while blogging. It was Marvin Garden's idea for me to blog about this year, and I poo-pooed the idea at first. Blogging. Okay. Maybe I could join one of those virtual reality worlds, too.

But I love it! Just today, I received a 1978 gossip magazine with Barry Gibb photos in it from faithful reader Kelly Garrett, who really only knows me through my blog.

My friend Dottie sent me a lovely note to cheer me, after she read here that I was blue. My sister-in-law sent me a PERFECT book, my mother just sent me beauty aids and such, because she knows I can't buy any, and my mother-in-law is sending me her hair conditioners for the same reason.

Without this blog, or bog, as Renee's mother would continue to say, I would not know dcrmom, stie, brownyn, jtcosby, kellie, fullyoperationalbattlestation, lara, Catherine, frankie -- and do you like how I have to keep everyone's names upper- or lowercase depending on how they write them in my comments? Could I be ANY BIGGER of a proofreading nerd?

Anyway. We decided to not spend for a year to see what it would be like. I had no idea it could be rewarding like this.



I leave you with this lovely photo taken at the wedding we went to earlier this year. The bride -- who I am also grateful to and who is still waiting for her gift -- just sent it to me. It encapsulates our views on dancing completely. Look at your June, there, shaking her groove thing, and those rather large hips. And then poor Marvin, thinking, "How long 'til this song is over? Will she like the next song? Are there any friends who look like they'd join her for the next number? When are her FEET gonna get sore? Will she ever stop?"

Cleanliness is next to cleanout. Go look in the dictionary.

Good morgen! As they would sort of say in Germany!! It is Sunday and it is CLEANING DAY. WHOOOOOOO! WHOO!

Okay, trying to get excited about stupid cleaning day.

I know I have mentioned this to you before, but the last time I mentioned it was January, and perhaps you have -- I don't know -- lived your life since then and you have forgotten, so I will reiterate.

Because I can no longer just call the cleaning lady, I have been doing the Martha Stewart cleaning technique from her Homekeeping Handbook. Go get this book if you want to know how to do anything in your house. Need to know how to have a lovely entryway? Which just sounded dirty but I meant your vestibule? Look at the Martha Stewart Homekeeping book! How long to keep your cosmetics? I think you know where to look.

So I am going to do each step of her Weekly Cleaning techniques and report back to you, so that (a) I have someone reading this and keeping track of me and (2) (...I never cease to think it's funny to say "a" then "2." When does my hilarity stop?) you can see what a fine, not-at-all never-ending time it is.

First, old Mart has six things you are supposed to do every day, like make the bed. I usually do none of those six things. Then she has these weekly tasks, then monthly, seasonal, SPRING (I am not kidding), then specific fall jobs. You know that heifer is doing none of these. Her staff has to do them, and they all want to bitch slap her.

Today I am only doing the weekly tasks. And I promise it'll take all dang day. Here we go:

10:29 a.m. I am starting with wiping everything in the kitchen.

10:31 a.m. I cannot find ANY rags. I find 8,945 towels, but no rags. Marvin is in there eating a watermelon while standing over the sink, and he says towels and cleaning rags are the same thing. I am already annoyed with him because he is getting pits everywhere. I am using an old t-shirt as a rag.

11:06 a.m. Seriously. That's how long that took me. I wiped cupboards, appliances, the oven, the furniture, you name it. My only distraction was when I cut the t-shirt into more manageable pieces and also when I was wiping an old mason jar and thought, "Wouldn't it be pretty if I gathered up all the sea glass and put it in this jar" which I did. Okay. Next I have to wipe the INSIDES (geez) of everything and flush the drain with boiling water.

11:39 a.m. Waiting for the STUPID water to boil, I managed the next three steps, including (yes) washing inside and outside the trash can.

[Two cleaning tips from June -- and yes, it is frightening that you would take cleaning tips from June -- if you boil your water in the microwave, it's then easier to clean inside said microwave. Also, a way to clean the trash can? Take the bag out and use it as the pail for washing the floor.]

11:57 a.m. The kitchen? It is done. Only 78 rooms to go.

12:21 p.m. Floors everywhere? Swept. Used the Swiffer-type thing (which my mother always. always calls a "Swifter" no matter how many times I correct her) AND the vacuum. Am disgusted at size of dust bunnies given that we have only lived here five weeks and that I have "Swiftered" before. Also increasingly annoyed that Marvin G. has apparently become centipede, as he has left 12 pairs of shoes in each room.

12:37 p.m. Have managed to take perfectly lovely, shiny tiles in kitchen and hallway and by washing them with Dawn dishwashing liquid, turn then into the dullest floors imaginable. It is like your 8th grade algebra teacher were the floor. The floors are comparable to a statistics book, advanced edition. I mean dull.

I am going to eat something, because I feel weak and shaky and realized all I have consumed today is black coffee.

12:54 p.m. Feeling emboldened by lasagna and a peach grown right here in our town, I soldier on to dust and to vacuum living room furniture.

1:24 p.m. Enter living room to find Marvin and our cat Francis luxuriating on couch. Both scatter, horrified, when I come stomping in with my Old English. Why, whyyyyyyyy do we own so much wood? In that room there are two bookshelves, an old chest used as coffee table, a Victrola, a PIANO, and an old radio that is four feet tall, which Winston hangs out in (see visual aid). Next up? Bathroom.


2:23 p.m. Have cleaned toilet, bathtub, sink, mirror and floor. I have dusted the light fixture and am laundering all throw rugs and blankets in house. Am beginning to detest Martha Stewart. Am beginning to wonder if this book is why she went to prison. Would love 10 minutes in prison with Martha and a shiv.


2:51 p.m. Dusted in dining room. If you think I moved the 4,756 knickknacks to dust under them, you would be wrong. Upon entering guest room to write in blog, find Marvin napping on guest bed. Think again of shiv.


3:06 p.m. Fluffed sofa pillows, threw away old catalogs and sorted the mail. Began putting away clean throw rugs and pillows, if they are dry. Swept front porch and walkway. Begin thinking of great-grandmother, who had a cleaning problem. She used to scrub the sidewalks, and my grandfather said if you got up to pee in the night, when you came back she had already made the bed. Wonder if she was this miserable. Wonder why I didn't inherit her need to clean.

Wonder why I was ever born.


3:21 p.m. Dusted spines and tops of all books, all ceiling fans and electronic equipment. Remember, this bitch expects you to do all this EVERY WEEK. What the hell is WRONG with this Nazi? If I were an Indian goddess with eight arms AND I was on speed, I could not do all of this. As I am dusting the phone, it rings. Marvin, taking his microwave popcorn out, yells, "PHONE!"


I being wondering if any of my old boyfriends are still single.


3:36 p.m. She STILL expects me to change and launder sheets and pillowcases in each bedroom, DUST in each bedroom and clean all the windows. Oh, and vacuum all the vents. I have been working for FIVE HOURS. I am sweaty, and decidedly cranky. I am giving up on this stupid woman and her stupid, stupid book. After all, tomorrow is another day.

Havin' a Flashback

Now that I have been gone from my job in LA for almost two months, I feel it is safe to tell you something that I have wanted to tell you since February. It is a chilling tale. It is


JUNE'S BIGGEST CHEAT THIS YEAR!!


I wish I had that dramatic chipmunk music. Have you seen that video on YouTube? Can I put it on here or will I get sued? Dcrmom hates it when people put YouTube on their blogs.

Okay. I'm gonna say it again, and then you click on the video. It'll be so dramatic.

It's JUNE'S BIGGEST CHEAT THIS YEAR!




And yes, I know it is a prairie dog and not a chipmunk. I didn't name the stupid thing.

The story begins back in November of 2006, before you knew me. Remember those heady days, when "Marvin Gardens" was just a piece of Monopoly property?

I had been at my job nine months. I liked it there. Then one night, out of the blue, during Entertainment Tonight and The Insider, my phone rang. It was this fancy finance company that I had interviewed with in 2005. They had another copy editor position coming up, and did I want it?

You guys, they pursued me. They called, they cajoled, they stood outside my window and played "In Your Eyes" by Peter Gabriel. I mean, this company wanted me.

Finally, in FEBRUARY, three months later, I decided to go there for an interview. It was way closer than my current job -- a drive of 15 minutes rather than an hour. Plus, they paid seventy million dollars a week, they gave you three weeks' vacation your first year, two bonuses, and all those ridiculous government holidays off, just like my stepsister the librarian has. That chick is never at work. "It's Arbor Day. We have the day off." Whatever with her.

So I took a personal day from the job I liked. When I woke up the morning of the interview, I was putting on the one suit I own and have had since 2002 when I realized...(maybe you should go replay the dramatic music)

I HAD LEFT MY MAKEUP AT WORK!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Because my commute was so terrible, and as a result I got there reallyreallyreallyreally early to avoid traffic, I would put my makeup on when I arrived. Do not ask me why I took ALL of it to work. I guess because it was all in this cute brown train case, and it was just easier to throw that in my car rather than pick through it and decide what came to work and what didn't.

But you guys. This was an interview for a fancy-ass job and yours truly is no spring chicken. I could NOT go there with zero makeup. I would not look fresh-faced. I would look like Merle Haggard.

So here's what I had to do. I had to scream over to CVS, crying in my suit, and buy all new makeup. Now fortunately, given my love for the cosmetics, I had basically been training for this event since I was nine. I was able to get foundation, eye shadow, an eyebrow brush, eyeliner, mascara and lipstick in about 27 seconds. When I got to the counter, the CVS worker said, "Would you like to apply for a CVS card today?! You'll save --"

"I HAVE A HUGE INTERVIEW IN HALF AN HOUR AND I HAVE NO MAKEUP!" I screamed. She shut up and put everything in a bag.

Anyway, they did offer me the job, after making me go there three times and interview with more than 10 people, but I turned it down. And every day I have to look at that illegal makeup, and I have been unable to tell you about it because I didn't want to get in trouble at what used to be my current job.

I think I spent like $37 on that makeup, and it was all Maybelline or some lowbrow brand. And you know I have used it all year? I used up the lipstick totally, and the eye shadow is low and the eye pencil is gone, too. I have virtually ignored my expensive makeup, sitting fancy and angry at the bottom of that train case.

So that's the tale. Oh, it's a relief to be truthful.

I could have been Jennifer on WKRP

Seriously. WHO told me I could proofread for a living? I made the BIGGEST mistake yesterday and had to spend the whole day sweatily fixing it. WHY did I think this was a job I was good at?

I am a flibbertygibbet. I think that goes without saying. I think no one ever wants to hear the word "flibbertygibbet" again anyway, so we're set. But really, I am a... you know. I should be a CRUISE director, or a movie star, or a princess. But a quiet, introverted job like proofreader? WHYYYYYY?

Anyway, I currently have no other choice, so I guess I'll proof the reading or read the proofs or whatever again tomorrow. Girlfriend has to bring home the sixteen dollars an hour or whatever sad sum she is currently dragging home.

You know, I was once a receptionist. I chose this profession when I first moved to Seattle, based mostly on the fact that there was a bar on the first floor of the building. This career worked for me. I dated FedEx delivery men, I chatted with the guy who came in to water the plants, I wrote funny things on people's messages. ("Jerry from WINK TV called. Said he had his EYE on you!")

But when I started dating Marvin Gardens, he got all self-esTEEm building on my ass. "Why are you doing this for a living? I see you doing so much MORE." Marvin was never much of a drinker. The whole bar-in-the-building thing did not sway him.

So that's why I proofread today. It is all Marvin's fault. HE should have been the one perspiring and tensing and cursing and mewling at this very desk all day.

But he can't cause he isn't here. And that is why I have gathered you all here today. Marvin had to go out of town, somewhere cool, for the night, for work. Could I have crammed more commas into that last sentence? His trip was paid for by his work, and he wanted me to come along. Have a swell time at the Holiday Inn or whatever. But you know what I did? I stayed here. I stayed here because it would have COST MONEY, and we are NOT SPENDING.

So it's just me, a can of Pringles, and eight episodes of Gray's Anatomy from Netflix. We are allowed Netflix because it is an expense we already had. Shut up.

McFlibbertygibbet out.

Clothes make the man really silly looking

I have a 17-page paper on research committees to proofread, and it was written by someone with an Ø in their name, so you know it's gonna be screwy English. And I have to get it done in the next four hours, because as soon as Marvin gets home we are OUT the door, and he's gonna be Mr. CrankerTrousers if he gets home and I had all day to proofread and yet I'm not done and what did I DO all day.

Nevertheless, dcrmom sent me a meme. So I must do it. I must do it now.

No one in blogworld knows what "meme" means. I love it that someone completely made up a word and we are all saying it. I am going to try that. I officially make up the word...sparklefraffle.

All words should have "sparkle" somewhere in them.

Okay, so my meme is, I have to list five of my clothing pet peeves. I know I am being deep on September 11th. Here we go:

Holiday sweaters. I am going to offend all of my female relatives, but cut it out with the seasonal sweaters. We know what holiday it is. We don't also need to see that shamrock in 3-D on your midsection.

Holiday socks. See above. Replace "midsection" with "instep." I have now been disowned. I will have to go in the basement and drink beer with the men in my family, because no one is lettin' me in the kitchen anymore. Not that I tried to help out in that kitchen so often.

Ill-fitting clothes. Now, this is a teenager thing and I know I am old because I do not get it. WHY is showing your muffin top acceptable? And do not get me wrong. I think women can be beautiful at all sizes. Give me Marilyn Monroe's body over Cameron Diaz's any day. But you didn't see Marilyn in low-hung pants and a short short T. Actually, she probably could have pulled that off.

I feel the same way about baggy clothes. With the underwear showing. When did I turn 147?

Irony. Yes, it's hilARious that you are hip AND you have on a redneck hat. Ooo! Somebody stop you! It's been done. Move on.

Men in flip-flops. This never bothered me until I met Marvin Gardens who canNOT stand feet. Oh, he gets sick at the sight of them. We have often joked that his worst job ever would be fitting people for toe rings on Venice Beach. So now, just like how I no longer drink anything with carbonation, I am also bothered by exposed feet -- but only on men. Somehow it skeeves me out.

I certainly hope no man is reading this in his holiday sweater, socks, flip flops and ironic hat with his muffin top hanging out, cause man, did I just lose a reader. And by the way, I am writing this in sweats from Target and the tank top I slept in. So I am one to talk.

Sparklefraffle!