RACONTEUR ROUNDUP

TRENDING THIS WEEK:

What Jesus and Santa have in common (it's not just Christmas!); your cab driver as Mr. January; morbid tweets; an especially creepy plastic surgeon; revenge porn, and more!

SHIT MEGYN KELLY SAYS

I'm sure she approved of Time Magazine's choice of its actual person of the year for 2013, Pope Francis. I never trusted her because her name is spelled with a Y for no apparent reason and I'm prejudiced against people who do that. If you're name is Jennyfer- or even worse, Yennyfer (that's Spanglish for Jennyfer)- or Megyn, you're not to be taken seriously. 

Here's what TV anthropologist MegYn Kelly had to say this week, in response to Slate's Aisha Harris's assertion that Santa Claus should be portrayed as a penguin:

"Jesus was a white man, too. It's like we have, he's a historical figure that's a verifiable fact, as is Santa, I just want kids to know that. How do you revise it in the middle of the legacy in the story and change Santa from white to black?"

As is Santa. Her kids must've been watching and she didn't want to ruin the charade for them. In defiance of the white St. Nick archetype, I photoshopped a picture of rapper DMX wearing a festive red cap not unlike this one:

and hung it around my house. I told my daughter that his reindeer are called Ruff Riders and explained to her that he has over 10 children living in multiple houses so he really is a Santa Claus. The only difference between St. DMX and Cracker Claus is that you can't ask St. DMX for what you want, he chooses. You just better hope it's not a murdergram.  

TAXI CAB CENTERFOLDS

If you read my last post, you'll know that I have a thing for cab drivers. And if you're anything like me, I know what you're thinking as you read this in the back of a cab on your way to work this morning: "I really want to see my driver's nips." Well, done. 

You're in luck this year because Mr. January trimmed down his pinky finger coke nail, Mr. March added some shimmer to his unibrow, Mr. April wears an even bigger turban, and Misters June thru September shaved their back hair.

WANTED: CHARACTER ACTOR TO PLAY MICHELLE OBAMA/OPRAH/BEYONCE

After Kerry Washington suffered from exhaustion after having to play every famous black female from DC to Hollywood in the course of one Saturday Night Live episode, some notable comedians who also meet that description were invited to audition for the show in LA. How lame that they all stood around and prayed in a circle. I had to squint harder at that picture to realize that it wasn't a joke. 

I'm available to be on SNL! I'm not African American, but I've been told I look ambiguously ethnic (must be the brown hair). 

Also, can everyone please stop saying ish? I get that it's now supposed to be a euphemism for shit, but I liked it much better when it was a synonym for semi. As in, semi automatic weapon =  automatic weaponish. 

IRRESPONSIBLE TWEETERERS

Some crappy driver killed a grandmother trying to walk along a crosswalk in the Bronx. The driver, 19, first tweeted after the incident, “All I really need right now is to clear my head and find peace of mind.” Unmoved by this teen's gravitas? Well she then tweeted a closeup of leftover lasagna. All this while her victim slowly slipped into the afterlife. I hate Twitter and everybody on it, except for me and the people that I follow. 

REVENGE PORN: STILL LEGAL!

As per this article from aptly titled British weekly magazine The Week, revenge porn (n.) is defined as, "...Photographs or video footage of a person, which are uploaded to the internet without the subject's permission and usually without their knowledge. The material is often put online by a former lover although there have been cases where hackers have managed to obtain pictures and uploaded them in an effort to humiliate or blackmail the subject. The images are often accompanied by personal details such as a person's Facebook and social media profiles, an act which compounds the sense of violation felt by the victim." 

A guy in San Diego was arrested for having an entire website devoted to this ish shit. This reminds me of a story I'm familiar with. As legend has it, Guy and Girl were high school sweethearts. Guy and Girl both got into college. Guy, fearful of prospect of losing Girl, proposes. Girl says yes. Guy and Girl are promised to each other but go to school in different states. Guy arranges to visit Girl. Guy catches Girl in act of cheating. Girl makes Guy sleep out on the street. Guy exacts the perfect revenge- creating a mock Mastercard commercial which was the most zeitgest-y thing ever back in 2002- and distributes it all around. It went something like this: 

Prom corsage: $50

Engagement ring: $500 (hey, the guy was still in high school)

Train tickets to Girl's university: $100

The perfect revenge: priceless

...and then cuts to raunchy crude footage of Guy and Girl boning, to the tune of Nas's Oochie Wally Wally (obviously- is there any other song to bone to?)

I felt for Girl. But I felt for Guy too. Who was the real winner? Me, because I got to watch the video without consequence. Yay!

THANKS DADDY!

This doctor got off to a bad start when he named his daughter Charm. But then he started doing really crazy things like sculpting her breasts and injecting all sorts of biohazards into her skull. You can watch the family video here. And after all that time and money (I guess services were free. Or at least I really hope they were free for the girls' sake, if you know what I mean) Charm looks like a cheesy porn star version of Kristin Cavallari and Brittany looks like a Brazilian tranny. Which is to say that they look like they live in southern California, which in fact they do, so it's all fine.  

PUSSY RIOTERS SEEK AMNESTY, PUTIN SHRUGS

How long until Urban Outfitters starts selling these balaclavas? I want one! It might scare the bejeezus out of my one year old, but she's used to Santa Claus looking like DMX, so she'll be ok. 

I recently watched a documentary on the group, their alleged crime ("hooliganism", which I'm guilty of every Thursday through Sunday) and trial. You can read more about them here, here, and here. There are a couple of reasons why I like this band, namely 1) that I've appointed one of the singers, Nadia, my Slavic doppelganger; 2) while on trial, when their attorney told them that Madonna had recently written FREE PUSSY RIOT on her back during a concert, they sort of dismissed it. They were just like, "Meh, ok." That's the same reaction I would have, I think. They take themselves way seriously and all seem like they have Aspergers but they're also fearless and lovable. I'd say that they'd be great role models for my daughter except for the whole thing about the group orgy in the biology museum. There will be none of that! 

95 AND SINGLE

This video, actually entitled 35 and Single, was in NYT's Op-Ed this week. It's just... I don't like it, but at the same time I think she's cute. I watched the video again with the mute button on and I liked it much better. I know that's mean, but it's the truth.

Her tag line is, "I’m 35, Argentine, Jewish and single. And these four categories don’t seem to go smoothly together." Don't we all have some "categories" that don't mesh well together all the time? And when these categories don't mesh well, there's conflict, which I'm sure most of us have experienced a good deal of. So why make an autobiographical video borne out of that idea, specifically? And why am I supposed to feel bad about the fact that you've been switching hot guys every two years? Who cares about you and your cracked iPhone and your scruffy Greek boy toys (are they still single, most importantly)? And why is this in the Op-Ed pages? 

My tag line is, "I'm 29, Agnostic, Jewish, and I love bbq spare ribs." Discuss.

FLO PURCHASES RAPE INSURANCE JUST IN CASE GEICO WEREWOLVES HAVE TO MUCH TO DRINK

That was either the best or worst headline I've ever come up with. 

Legislators in Michigan don't have much to do now that Detroit is bankrupt, so they just passed a bill requiring women to purchase rape insurance if they want their post-rape medical treatment (read: abortions) covered. I gather that any number of crackhead squatters wouldn't have had the wherewithal to purchase insurance in the event of an abandoned back alley rape. I also gather that this kind of rape happens in Detroit. Didn't they fire two-thirds of their police force? Women of Detroit: never leave home. 

My Driver, Ali

I used to have a driver. His name was Ali.

Ali took me wherever I wanted to go, whenever I wanted him to. The best part was that his services were free. No matter the traffic conditions, distance, or how many times I offered to pay him, my ride was complimentary. And I called him almost daily. This went on for over two years.

Ali was fiercely loyal to me for reasons that I never quite understood. I met him one rainy night during the beginning of my freshman year. My roommates and I were headed to a bar in Georgetown, and we hailed a cab outside of our dorm. It was like any other cab ride, until we heard sirens and saw blue and red lights flashing behind us. A cop car was fast approaching. My first clear memory of Ali is of him panicking. He sharply turned the steering wheel toward the curb and slammed on the brakes.

I can't remember why the cop pulled him over, but it started to seem like a much bigger deal than a busted headlight. Based on Ali's reaction the cab might have been a stolen vehicle. Or he committed the third of some kind of 'three strikes and your out' violation. Perhaps he was involved in a hit and run. Maybe somebody put out an Amber Alert on his plates. Or he could have been the leader of an underground ring of terrorists. Whatever he was guilty of, Ali was shitting his pants.

And then something magical happened. One of my roommates, a very pretty girl who had a striking appearance with jet black hair and a white complexion, rolled down the window. She got the cop's attention, and they started talking. The cop put his elbows on the window frame and leaned all the way in. He was young, probably in his early twenties. He was smitten.
"Will I see you again?" she inquired flirtatiously. She was being very deliberate.
"Here's my card," he replied. "Write down your number for me."
My four other roommates and I exchanged uncomfortable looks, wondering whether cops normally had business cards. I imagined that he did this sort of thing fairly often.
"Sure," she smiled sweetly, "but before I do, I'd love it if you did me a huge favor. I'm not quite sure why you pulled over my friend here, but he's a hardworking guy. He didn't mean to do anything wrong. Would you consider letting him off with a warning for me, just this once?"
The cop mulled it over for all of five seconds. He was kind of an idiot. "Well..."
She wrote her number on the card and gave it back to him. The cop pointed at our driver and muttered something, and then took off.

Ali turned the car back on and turned around, scanned his eyes back and forth across all of us seated in the back, then glanced over to my friend sitting next to him. He turned around to the back again and pointed his finger, looking intensely and directly at my dark haired friend. He spoke in a thick, almost unintelligible Pakistani accent.
"What just happened was by the grace of God. I am eternally grateful for your actions. You are an angel. You saved me."
We were all fidgety and she was even more so. "Look, let's just go. It really wasn't a big deal," she assured him. "We're late."
Ali couldn't be deterred. "Mark my words. From this night on, I will work for you and every single person who witnessed what just happened. I will regret it deeply if I do not get the opportunity to repay you."

He handed out his business card. I started to think that I should have one, with a picture of me, stoned and giggling and sloppily eating an Au Bon Pain chicken caesar wrap with the title MARCIA: COLLEGE FRESHMAN.

My dark haired friend was the first one to hit him up for a solid, which was only fair, after a few days. He showed up exactly on time, and presented her with a box of Chanel Chance perfume. "This is from me and my family," he said.

Under most circumstances I'd presume that there were strings attached to this kind of bizarre arrangement, but he was the sort of guy who kept his word no matter the cost. Although I wondered what it was that he was so afraid of when the cop rapped on his window.

After a while my dark haired friend stopped calling him. I think she felt bad, sensitive to what some may have perceived as her taking advantage of a desperate person. My other friends no longer bothered with him, either. Not me! I remembered that he made the same promise to all of us, and I felt like I had won the lottery. I was going to work this privilege into the ground. I was broke. I made minimum wage as a college bistro waitress under the federal work study program. I lived in an expensive city. I needed rides all the time. This was my golden ticket!

Ali drove me everywhere. He took me to and from my second job at an inner-city elementary school in northeast D.C. He drove me to Union Station, Baltimore, Tyson's Corner, Arlington, Crystal City, Bethesda, College Park, even Newark, NJ. He caught me stuffing a hundred bucks into the crevices of his backseat right before he was about to drop me off at BWI airport, which made him flip out (he made me keep it). He even bought me holiday presents. I in turn presented him with "winter gifts" for his wife and kids because I had no idea what he was into spiritually, although I gathered he didn't celebrate Chanukah. We talked about all kinds of things. We had an unlikely friendship that was both strange and comforting.

One day I called Ali for a ride to the airport. For the first time, he told me that he was preoccupied. He apologized profusely, but said that he was sending someone in his place to come and get me. "Look for a white van with a tall driver," he told me. Sure enough, twenty minutes later, a car pulled up that matched Ali's description. A white van. I wondered if I should be worried, but the driver seemed alright. I hopped in the back.
"You sure you want to sit back there?" my new driver inquired.
"As opposed to what?" I asked.
"Sitting up here next to me," he replied.
"Nah, I'm good...so how do you and Ali know each other?"
The tall driver ignored me. I kept my head turned toward the window. We wound down New York Avenue and around the convention center. He briefly pulled over.
"Sit up here," he instructed.
"Jesus, fine," I relented, thinking that I was supposed to be nice to this pushy louse because he was a friend of my homeboy Ali.
We kept going. Things were starting to look less and less familiar. At first I thought that since this was a different driver, he must have had his own favorite route. But then I started to get a very uneasy feeling.
"Umm... sir? Where are we?" I fixated my eyes on the nearest intersection to read the signs. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. Oh no.
He pulled over again. "Get out."
"Wh... Why?" I stammered.
"Leave your things here." He pointed toward the ATM straight ahead. "Clear out the money in your account. I'll be waiting."
I exited and walked toward the bank. I took note of a sticker on the building's front door that read BANK OF AMERICA: ANACOSTIA BRANCH. Oy. Ever heard Dave Chapelle's skit about the 'baby on the corner'? He probably got his inspiration from this area. Fortunately, though, my cell phone was in my pocket. I dialed out to Ali with trembling hands.
"Hey, Ali. Listen, sorry to bother you but this friend of yours is bad news. At first he was trying to get in my pants. Now he's lead me to Southeast and he's trying to rob me. I'm scared, Ali. Help me!"
"I'm on my way. In the meantime, ignore his requests. Just walk back to the car right now and let me talk to him."
What was said next I had no idea, because it was all in Pakistani.  But the tall driver was flailing his arms about and screaming. I got the impression that he had intended to rob a different person. He loudly snapped my flip phone, popped the trunk and chucked my suitcase on the curb. Then he drove off without uttering another word.
I twiddled my thumbs on MLK Boulevard as I waited to be saved. Tk tk tk tk tk, a crackhead scurried past. Where was Ali?
He arrived a half an hour later. He gave me a hug and apologized for all the confusion.
"Sorry about my associate. He's an asshole."
I rolled my eyes. "Clearly."

That wasn't the last time I saw Ali, but it was near to it. This unfortunate rendezvous with his 'associate' made me wonder what kind of a person Ali really was. It was apparent that my congenial driver was involved in some pretty sordid after-hours dealings. I was willing to look the other way to keep getting free rides, but somehow we lost touch. I thought about what other types of convenient friends I should make. At that point in my life, a cop would have been useful.

RACONTEUR ROUNDUP

Sorry for skipping last week. My post-Thanksgiving dinner stomach remained distended for at least 48 hours, obscuring my feet when I looked downwards, and I was emotionally unready to look at hot people on the internet.

TRENDING THIS WEEK:

Your kids: in the womb, postpartum, and in college; Speidi gets spendy (that's the media-whoring couple from The Hills, in case nobody remembers); the state with the largest average dick size (it's NOT Texas); the Don Draper of dope, and more!

WOMAN'S POSTPARTUM BODY DEEMED TOO HOT TOO SOON

Caroline Berg Eriksen, the fitness guru wife of a guy who is famous in Europe, looked like this just a few days after having her daughter. Some blogger lady (not me) said in reaction to this photo, "This is not a selfie. This is an act of war." Well, she's an idiot on account of her first proclamation- this is definitely a selfie. As for the act of war bit, I was compelled to read more, so I went to her blog. My suspicions were confirmed- she is a jealous nerd. "If I looked like Eriksen I would also possibly refuse to put on clothes ever again and I would be struttin' around the house in my size 0 knickers and my maternity bra all day listening to Diana Ross's 'I'm Coming Out'," she says. Umm... ok. I'd personally don a skin-tight Herve Leger dress, go to a club, and let any number of bankers buy me drinks all night to make up for 9 months of abstinence. But that's just me. 

When I was in the postpartum room after my delivery a year ago, the nurse gave me a big white net. "What's this?" I inquired. "It's your underwear for the next few days," she replied. "First, you put on the net like underwear, there are holes for your legs. Then, you line the bottom of the net with two giant heavy-duty absorbency pads. Then you line the pads with Tuck's witch hazel cooling pads. Then you spray on some Dermaplast. Then you squirt this water bottle up your hoo-ha. Then you lift up the netting toward your waist." I tried to go over the instructions several times in my head. I went to the bathroom and did all that she said. "How does it feel?" she asked me when I came out. "Like I just took a heavy dump in a giant pre-soaked diaper," I whined. "Great, you did it right!" she said enthusiastically. I think of this conversation as I look at this hot girl's picture. I can't see even a trace outline of massive pads. This girl's done a good job with herself.

I feel bad for her daughter, though. Imagine having a mom who looks like that. I'm glad my mom looked the way she did when I was growing up. She was always decent looking enough for me to have some bit of confidence in my inherited destiny, but she wasn't overwhelmingly good looking in a way that would make me feel threatened. Plus, it was easier to lift the fishnet of afterbirth pads up the short legs that I inherited from my mother. Less distance from my crotch to the floor, which really cut down on my prep time. Thanks, Mommy!

SCIENCE: EXCESSIVE CONSUMPTION OF "FROOT LOOPS, CHEETOS AND NUTELLA" DURING PREGNANCY IS A BAD IDEA

I wish this article came out 13 months ago. Maybe I could've looked like Mrs. Eriksen. Maybe I would've thought twice about my dehydrated boxed cheese cravings (though I'm sure it wouldn't have stopped me). Basically, the article says that if you eat like a fat-ass when you're pregnant and breastfeeding, your kid is going to eat like a fat-ass too. Explains why my one-year-old daughter's favorite foods are fried chicken and watermelon. Well, partially explains it, anyway. Recall that I used to have a thing for basketball players.

THE HARDEST PART ABOUT BEING A HARVARD STUDENT IS GETTING IN

Douche overheard at local Starbucks register, "Insufficient funds? Impossible! I went to Harvard!"

Current and former classmates of Lee M. Cardholder were shocked (or not) to hear that the most frequently awarded grade at Harvard is an A.  Well, Harvard elitists, does your school inflate the high school grades of incoming freshmen? Yours probably didn't have to. But mine did. It's too bad we were removed from the US News rankings in 2012, because I was really impressing people when I told them that I went to America's Fifty-First Best School.

SPENDY SPEIDI

It doesn't even matter at this point who these people are and why they were once famous. All that matters now is that they are allegedly very poor because they didn't know what to do with their money.

I've often wondered about these riches to rags types. Take Mike Tyson (and Evander Holyfield too), Ed McMahon, Nicholas Cage, Toni Braxton... examples of people that were once filthy rich and then pissed all their money away. How could one possibly squander so much? I now finally have some insight via this Buzzfeed breakdown, which names the esteemed sources In Touch magazine and Daily Mail. But I mean, it's Buzzfeed, and we're talking about Heidi and Spencer Pratt, so who the hell cares. Highlights: Heidi spent $200,000 on plastic surgery, and spent $20,000-30,000 on individual shopping trips.

ANOTHER REASON TO BONE A NORTH DAKOTAN (AS IF YOU NEEDED ONE)

Brett Favre didn't do much for the Minnesota ranking

This list was compiled by a condom shop, so it's total bullshit. I mean, Rhode Island is number 2. But it's still fun to draw contrived conclusions about the results. New Jersey guido muscle meatheads are famous for having 'roid shrunken junk, I'd expect them to come in somewhere around 45. Alabama doesn't make sense either- I'd expect them to be at the bottom of the list, what with all the leprechauns roaming around there (and you know what they say about leprechauns). I've mostly been with foreign guys, so I can't really speak to the accuracy one way or another, except to say it seems really wrong. It's so tough for me to relate that I feel like a lesbian scrolling through this list.

THE DON DRAPER OF POT

Obviously the Don Draper of pot is pudgier than that other Don Draper... this one eats Funyuns at night instead of hooking up with his secretary. Mason Tvert's profile as Director of Communications for the Marijuana Policy Project is pretty cool (aside: it's no surprise that he's friends with Bill Maher). It's like my dad always said, "Fuck the alcohol lobby." Yes that is in fact something that my dad says often.

RIDIN' THE COTTON PONY

 

In case you haven't seen it, this is my favorite thing this week. Right now I'm feeling flirty (F- does that also stand for foreigner?) but I'd also really love a heating pad (HP) and I just ate an oatmeal cookie which unfortunately didn't make it to the chart. Too healthy.

RACONTEUR ROUNDUP

TRENDING THIS WEEK: A wedding that I actually 

care about, Björk being...Björk, how not to quit your job, aging 

un-gracefully, getting paid to poop, the Brittany Murphy death conspiracy, and more!

MAZEL ALERT

En route to a yoga retreat with oversized sunnies and venti Starbucks cups. Hate us much?

My best friend in the world is getting married. I'm gearing up to be her lap bitch on Saturday. This isn't technically news in the objective sense, but it's my news, and it's my fucking blog.


ICELANDIC TINKERBELL: THERE IS A LITTLE CITY DWELLING IN THE BACK OF YOUR TV SET



I don't know why this was brought up in The Atlantic this week, because I'm pretty sure that this video is from the nineties. But it's timeless. Björk is so totally from another planet! Here's Kristin Wiig brilliantly channeling her on SNL. 



QUITTING

Dear Woman:  I presume that you are a young woman. I understand that you just quit your accounting internship at one of the Big Four because you just couldn't stand another minute of it.  You thought you'd quit in some kind of grandiose way, by sending an email to your entire audit team, offering your resignation in the most crass and idiotic way possible: with poorly contrived hash tags. Listen, you little shitstain: you are a millennial if there ever was one. It's an internship, girl! You should know that more than half of the recipients of this whiny tantrum didn't click on it because they didn't recognize your name! If you really want to send a "shove it" message to your employer that wins the hearts of oppressed workers everywhere, your quitting story must at least be equal to that of Steven Slater. Excuse me, that's Steven FUCKING Slater. All your Beyonce ramblings are meaningless, by the way. Especially to accountants. #ingrate


SAD TRUTHS OF ADULTHOOD

Some of these are really stupid and almost all of them are obvious. It IS hard to make friends after college. I moved to 3 different cities since I turned 22, 2 of which I'd never lived in before. I had the distinct displeasure of trying to meet "couple friends" with my husband. It's harder to make friends when you're married after college. Everyone just presumes that you're a pair of crusty old swingers. I swear we weren't. Although I make no guarantees 18 years from now when my daughter's in college and I'm bored.

I'm going to add to this list. Things you SAY as you get older:

• "If I was that girl's mother I'd tell her to cover up. And also, her ass looks amazing."
• "Why are these freckles still lingering on my face 3 months post-summer?"
• "I just did the Master Cleanse for 12 weeks- and I lost an entire pound!!"
• "Yessir, of COURSE you can see my ID! Do I look that young? :)"
• "So the real point I'm trying to make is tha-- oh shit. Wait what was I saying. I forgot to take my Gingko Biloba this morning."
• [At nail salon]: "Harry Styles is dating Kendall Jenner... who the hell are these people?"
• "Mom and dad, I'm coming over to feed you tonight. And don't forget to take your synthroid medication with your meal."
• "Last night was so much fun. I don't even remember what happened, except that I ate a slice of pumpkin pie, drank a bottle of wine and then blacked out on my couch before I finished this incredible HBO documentary about illegal organ transplants."

EARN SOME LOOT WHILE YOU TOOT

Your dream career: pooping. This is the job posting if you're interested. It's supposed to benefit New York or something. I don't know about you, but if I have to go my first instinct isn't to search on Yelp to read what chatty Asian teenage girls are saying about the closest bathroom. It's usually a bit more urgent than that. I'll save tales of my incontinence for another time- sorry to disappoint- but I do have an observation about West Coast toilets. They are cleaner than any bathroom I've ever been to back home on the East Coast. Maybe it's the toilet seat covers, which I find in every stall here. I thought they were mandated in the state of California given the state's public restrooms law- hey, wait! Maybe I should apply for the job! Should I do it?


THIS WEEK'S NAZI

Last week we had the black white power guy shaming himself on British television. This week's Nazi is the guy who shot Larry Flynt, President of Larry Flynt Enterprises aka publishers of Hustler Magazine aka Playboy with vaginas. Aside: Hustler worldwide headquarters is located in the same building as the Brazilian diplomatic consulate here in Beverly Hills. Coincidence?

Joseph Paul Franklin was a wingnut who named himself after the notorious Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels. He was also purportedly diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, which you'd think would be enough to exempt someone from a death sentence. Nope! Not in the USA.

In addition to being a serial killer, he tried to assassinate Larry Flynt because his magazine printed photos of interracial people doing it. What do you think Mr. Franklin would have to say about Björk? She's not Jewish or Black but she's definitely an alien.


THE SMELL OF SICKNESS

Scientists at Penn are working on detecting the smell of ovarian cancer by monitoring an electronic nose that sniffs the blood of sick people. This reminds me of when I got mono in college. I wasn't feeling well and my throat hurt like it had never hurt in my life. I went to the student health clinic at my university. The person checking me out was a total moron.
"It appears that your glands are swollen," she observed. "I'm noticing a cut on your leg- likely from shaving. Your lymph nodes must be responding to that infected site." 

Sounded like bullshit to me, but I shrugged and left. I returned to my dorm room. Later that week I still felt like death and my friend came up to me. 
"Open your mouth," she said. I was too sick and tired to experiment with my sexuality at that moment but I did it anyway. She pulled her head closer and took a few sniffs. 
"You definitely have mono," she pointed out. "That's what mono smells like. Are you constantly tasting a weird Cheerios taste?" 
"Yup." 
"Feel better." 
My friend was a genius! (She turned out to be an event planner, not a doctor). Now, if you Google "mono smell," it appears to be a thing. If mono has a certain odor to it, I'd imagine that other diseases might too, right? I hope that science gets to the bottom of it.   


TOLDJA

Last week I wagged my finger at Chip Wilson, and the Lululemon CEO continues to be an idiot. He was just selected to be Stephen Colbert's Alpha Dog of the Week.




THIS CHICK IS AUCTIONING OFF HER VIRGINITY...AGAIN

I know I'm straight because I look at this picture and the first thing I think is, "She has amazing hair." Anyway, her website isn't working. That's at least one obstacle in her quest to bank $1.5 million to get freaky for the first second time. She was offered over $700,000 in an earlier contest by a Japanese business man- and, well, if stereotypes are true, after that experience she might still technically be a virgin.


BRITTANY MURPHY WAS MURDERED BY 'SHADOWY GOVERNMENT OPERATORS'

Her dad is insisting that's what happened, anyway. What about her creepy husband? He died under similar, weird circumstances that same year. And after she died her mom moved in with her husband. That's also pretty weird. I hold the view that she died from anorexia. I don't know why I've been so fascinated by this story.

On Mothering

Check out my contribution, 10 Mommy Mantras: The First Year, to the very irreverent and funny highchairsandheadaches.com!

RACONTEUR ROUNDUP - November 15th, 2013

TRENDING THIS WEEK:

Larry David, black Nazis, procreation, being nice (even after you've killed someone), deliciously dehydrated 'food', and more!

Larry David Would Rather Be Selling Cars



...or maybe he's just lethargic from eating a Benadryl brownie.
Either way, this is the scowl of the week.

Life Imitating Art... The Case of the Black White Supremacist



"Racially aware" North Dakotan Craig Cobb appeared as a guest on an English black woman's talk show. These circumstances are odd enough, but it gets wilder when an analysis of Cobb's DNA is revealed to him on air. Highlight: he dismisses his 14% sub-Saharan ancestry as "statistical noise" while a fellow guest clad in an African turban cackles at him.

Comedy Central

Remember the visually challenged Clayton Bigsby? In the end he divorced his wife for being a- well, just watch it. I don't want to kick off my first Roundup by using the N word.

Be Fruitful, Before Your Ovaries Turn Into Raisins


Amber and Jenelle: Teen Mom Alumnae and Members of the Under 25 Club

America thinks that women should have babies before the age of 25. Note that poll respondents who graduated college were more likely to take the view that women should wait "until they are 26 or older."

The inverse relationship between intelligence (and income and education) and birth rates has been widely studied. To summarize: dumb people have more kids.

Take Idiocracy's illustration of this phenomenon:



Graduate degrees are worthless, so stop clinging to your irrelevant, highfalutin diplomas. And the hard-hitting journalists at Good Day LA are currently running a series about how you're totally fucked if you wait to have kids. So for all you upwardly mobile cohabiting yuppies out there, your seed is unlikely to spread very far. Just stick to adopting French bulldogs, as you've been doing.


Reviving The Greatest Slang Terms of Yesteryear

Me and my chuckaboo headed to the benjo for some mafficking, I met a gal who wasn't very afternoonified so we did the bear, after which she let me batty-fang her. Best sentence ever.


Mitzvahs



Two of many affected by Typhoon Haiyan

It's a sad state of affairs in the Philippines. I donated my weekly Cronut allowance to the good souls at the World Food Programme. Please consider doing the same.


Ronald Phillips, saint of death row

The governor of Ohio granted a stay of execution to death row inmate Ronald Phillips, who's execution was originally scheduled for this week. Phillips requested the postponement to allow extra time for him to arrange the donation of his vital organs to immediate family members in need. He was convicted of raping and killing a 3 year-old child in 1993.

I haven't been following this case until now, but organ donation hits home for me. Dad has been kept alive for over 5 years thanks to the liver of an anonymous 18 year old. Update those drivers' licenses, people! Just please don't kill any children.


Dehydrated Delicacies



Contains 100% of the daily three C's: Corn, Chemicals, and Crack.

Did you know that some cheese powder products contain more additives than cheese? I, for one, am shocked- I didn't think there was any real cheese in there at all! I feel vindicated, in a way. I am addicted to Easy Mac. That's lowbrow and disgusting, I'll admit it. Whatever. I ate these yellow chemicals by the family-sized box load when I was pregnant. I even asked my OB-GYN if she knew of any birth defects associated with excessive consumption of industrial cheese powder. She nodded no, and went back to playing Words With Friends on her iPhone. Let's just say that when my daughter was jaundiced as a newborn, I wasn't surprised.



Peanut butter with a powdered cheese consistency? Yes, please!

...And then I moved to LA. I know I've assimilated because I put down the cheesy fairy dust in search of something a less toxic. My friend just introduced me to PB2 and it's really good (for what it is). Compared to my reduced fat peanut butter, it has:

1/4 of the calories per serving
4g less sugar
only 2g less protein
no trans fat or saturated fat

Best of all, it contains real peanuts (or so they say).

Update: If you care, you can read this assessment from a healthy, attractive woman who hates PB2. Do you prefer mold to calories? I prefer mold.


Running: It's For Fatties

How long will it take to work off this KFC Double Down?

This article, on why consistent running can be an obstacle to weight loss, may help to explain why my weight plateaus at times, despite significantly increasing my mileage (I'm an avid runner). I know what you're thinking- "It's the Easy Mac consumption, stupid!" No, it isn't- I quit that for now.


Lululemon 'Celebrates Failures'

Lululemon, the overpriced, yogi-centric, fat-shunning, lifestyle apparel label is in more hot water after founder Chip Wilson read a page from creepazoid Abercrombie & Fitch CEO Mike Jeffrie's playbook by indiscriminately alienating parts of his consumer base. Neither here nor there: a few Lululemon employees live in my building. One is a yoga instructor. As far as I know, all of them drive to work. The store is down the street from me, a stone's throw away. Why aren't they walking? Are they ashamed that their butt cracks will be visible to the public through the threadbare materials that bind their $95 pants together? Now that I think of it, that's probably why.


Speaking of Butt Cracks

Miss Bum Bum 2013 has been chosen. Bow down.

Introducing...Your Weekly Raconteur Roundup!

It's here.

Your life just got better!

At the end of the week, I will post my 'best of' news items from around the web, with added snarky commentary. This is my gift, every Friday, to you.

Bring your green hat- we're going streaking to discuss important zeitgeist-y things!

Sign up to receive email updates, which may or may not be free. And contribute to the conversation.

What's better than receiving a humorous riff from me at the end of the work week? Wait don't answer that- many things are better. Even so, it's just another reason to celebrate Fridays!

Jawbreaker

A conduit of near-death


Did your parents ever tell you that you're not supposed to eat things off of the floor? Mine never did. I guess you could say they shouldn't have had to- but I was the kind of kid that needed serious direction. Plus, recall how all I had to eat in my childhood were bell peppers.

My brother and I were bullshitting around the town pool. My parents signaled to us that it was time to go. We picked up our towels, our cooler filled with stale cream cheese sandwiches, and our thermoses of tap water and started moving. We slowed down after taking note of some abandoned jawbreakers on the floor of the pool cafeteria. I bent down and picked up a big one- it didn't look too slimy so I figured it fell out of someone's pocket before they got to eat it. I know, I'm so discerning. It's what you'd expect from an 18 year old. Just kidding- I was 6. Or 8.

I popped the jawbreaker into my mouth. Mom turned around. I tried to conceal it by tucking it up to the roof of my mouth so that she couldn't see it protruding through my cheek- a task that is impossible because large jawbreakers are like 3 inches in diameter. Of course the thing slid all the way back into my throat. I gasped for air, and- nothing. I stopped breathing. I remember thinking to myself: "Is this the end? Am I going to die?" And also, "I'm a fucking idiot." 

I ran toward my dad and gave him the good ol' international choking sign. He clearly never took CPR, but he had good instincts. He flipped me upside down and punched me in the back. My would-be killer plopped onto the pavement. This time it was slimy. Dad turned me right side up again and straight up backhand bitch slapped me. Then he gave me a hug. Some lifeguards were standing by, just looking on and scratching their nuts and twirling their whistles. This was a debacle of the non-aquatic variety, which meant that it was beyond their scope.

I told this harrowing tale at a job interview. Yes I did. 

It was a post-college, second round job interview at a Wall Street investment firm. My interviewer, a Managing Director, asked me a most irrelevant, off-the-cuff question: "What's the worst thing that's ever happened to you?" So I told him about how I was almost killed by a jawbreaker. I think the answer he was looking for was something along the lines of, "One time I created a pivot table and the data wasn't updating or sorting correctly it was HORRIBLE but don't worry because in the end I used my intellectual horsepower and sat in front of the screen for 12 hours because I'm such a diligent worker and I'm so great so I fixed it and everything was fine!" 

When I finished answering, he pursed his lips and said, "OK. Look, I wasn't expecting that. What you just told me is awful, just awful. I'm a parent, I have young children. Twins, in fact. I'm going to go home tonight and hit the sack and have terrible nightmares."

So I got up and he said he'd be in touch and I headed down the elevator into the lobby. Then when I got down to the street I realized that I left my folio in his office, so I had to go back upstairs and ask him for it. Talk about awkward.

I did not get the job.