HOLE. EEEE. FUCK.

Oh my god.

OH MY GOD.

PEOPLE! FOR REAL! LOOK!

Judith Light. AUTOGRAPHED.

I have yet to stop screaming. I don't believe I ever will.

Blessings and Loave and the Eternal Light of Judith to Martha.

And Cyn pointed out a very valid oversight on my part. OF COURSE there were pictures of the Drunk Ho's and Ugly Dudes at the bar last night. OF COURSE.

I just left them on the camera, at home. Where I am right now, so look! Pictures!

(Click for the full versions, yo.)

From left to right: Bald Grey Polo Shirt is Alpha Male who, for some weird reason, was the one who got all the lapdance action AND was spotted making out with both women. He swapped ladies when Black Talbot's Biz Casual went to the bathroom. Black Talbot's Biz Casual lost her lap to Fluffy Hair (in red, seen here doing a little seat cha-cha). Guy In Jacket just sort of stood there, just like that, all night. Non-Bald Grey Polo Shirt was the owner of the laptop that Black Talbot's Biz Casual spilled a beer on. He wore a lot of pagers and phones.  The beer belonged to Tacky Golf Shirt (not pictured), who was Black Talbot's Biz Casual's back-up guy after she lost out on Alpha Male.

"Look at meeee! I am strong! Feel my muscles! Wheee!"

Alpha Male: *hot tongue action*

Fluffy Hair: *about to vomit*

Guy In Jacket: *kind of thinks these people are jackasses*

Non-Bald Grey Polo Shirt: Heh. Heh. Yeeeah.

It's the elusive Tacky Golf Shirt Guy! Totally working the fanny pack too.

(And while this picture looks tame? Please bear in mind that I seriously watched this woman lick this man's face. Yes. LICK.)

Okay, okay, enough with meanness. They were wasted, they were loud, they were all married and vaguely squicky.

But we were also drunk. Luckily, instead of licking random guys' faces, I just staged elaborate productions using the plastic bulls that came with our mojitos.

Yellow Bull: How YOU doin'?

Green Bull: *about to vomit*

See Amalah. See Amalah Lose Her Shit.

SEE AMALAH UPDATE AFTER A WHOLE DAMN DAY FOR SHE IS LAZY:

Friday. Fri. Day. Bitch. Es.

Too bad I woke up thinking it was Saturday. I’ve actually done that every blessed day this week. I blame D.C. Restaurant Week, which has required me to get dressed up every night and go out for dinner at swanky places and totally gives every night a Friday night vibe.

(Restaurant Week is well, a week where, well, restaurants lower their prices and let the poor white trash in for a three-course meal for $30 a person. Which should mean you get a meal that would usually cost over $100 for about $60, except that every place we’ve gone we’ve still ended up paying over $100 because we’re snooty people who demand lots of wine pairings and cocktails and sparkling water blessed by little French nuns or whatever.)

Last night we ate at some Nuevo Latin Cuisine Culinary Trend du Jour place that was awesome. Quite very much awesome. Quite very much mojitos. Hemingway Mojitos, actually, which are still just booze with sugar and mint but are literary, and therefore sophisticated.

We drank these literary cocktails and actually were more sophisticated than 90% of the jackasses at the bar, for they were Bad, Sloppy, Embarrassing Drunks.

Recipe For Hilarious Floor Show Cocktail:

First, you will need:

2 somewhat attractive yet nearing middle-aged women
5 totally unattractive middle-aged men on a business trip
5 tacky patterned golf shirts.
3 bald heads
1 toupee
7 wedding bands
8 pagers
6 constantly ringing cell phones.
8 glasses of house merlot
17 beers
5 martinis
Desperation (to taste)

Remove inhibitions with melon baler. Apply alcohol liberally and season with a heavy sense of desperation. Set alpha-male aside to marinate in beer.

Women should now be screeching at an increased volume and finding everything hysterical. Make sure to douse their Talbot’s biz casual wear with an extra helping of wine. Give men napkins to help clean them up in a completely gratuitous manner. Add one to alpha-male bowl for some booty shaking and grinding on a bar stool.

Shoot bartender look like, “Oh my god are you seeing this too?” 

Swap females so slightly younger one can make out with the bald and fat alpha-male until she falls off the bar stool. Combine older female and random other male with a turquoise golf shirt. Shake. Watch the horror.

Spill beer on someone’s laptop. Stir with inappropriate threats of spanking. Bring out photos of kids. Add French-kissing and remove any remaining Shame that may be floating around.

Continue mixing all ingredients around until the bartender flags them, gives them a bill so long it takes four receipts, and kicks their sorry asses out.

SEE AMALAH STILL COP OUT ON REALLY WRITING ANYTHING:

Amalah: give me something funny to write about today so my readers don't all abadon me
Amalah: abandon, even
Amalah: also buy me a dictionary

Chris: I can do that
Chris: um...funny...
Chris: nothing good from dinner last night?

Amalah: a couple funny/sad things from the bar scene, but not enough for a whole entry

Chris: I was going to say...that sounded like some decent material...but whatever would have made it funnier?  make up!

Amalah: lie? on a BLOG? are you MAD?
Amalah: the blog police would get me!

Chris: I know!  I'm just that frickin radical
Chris: oh yes, the blogtroopers

SEE AMALAH MAKE POLITE CONVERSATION WITH HERSELF:

Amalah: You are very sad. You didn’t update yesterday and yet you still have nothing to write about.
Amalah: Shut up.

Amalah: You also wussed out on the Haiku Smackdown, to the disappointment of dozens.

Amalah: Fuck you, bitch.

Amalah: Also, why don’t you go eat a sandwich or something? Jesus.

Amalah: Why don’t I just punch you in the face?

SEE AMALAH BORE YOU WITH WORK TALK:

So remember those 11 reports I need to write and get to print by next Tuesday? Here’s how that’s going:

Number of reports that are DONE, as in DONE: Two

Number of reports that are DONE, as in I DON’T CARE ANYMORE: Two

Number of reports that are NOT DONE, but GETTING THERE: Five

Number of reports that are NOT DONE, and NOT EVEN CLOSE, OH MY GOD: Two

Number of extra small printing tasks that I did not include in the 11, but is also DONE and therefore has been added to the task list for the sole purpose of crossing it out as DONE in bright red ink: One

SEE AMALAH DECLARE AN END TO ALL THE MADNESS:

I’ve given myself a deadline. Thursday, August 5th.  That seems like a nice date.

Either I write an entry on a single topic, start to finish, without all the lists and lame IM conversations, and actually say something remotely intelligent, and quit with the run-on sentences, by August 5th, or else…

Or else…

Well. Either I do all that by my deadline or else I miss my deadline. And that would be bad and stressful for me.

Wednesday Advice Smackdown

SURGEON GENERAL’S WARNING: KVETCHING ABOUT A LACK OF QUESTIONS MAY LEAD TO AN OVERABUNDANCE OF QUESTIONS.

Your advice columnist woke up this morning with a vague hangover and a bad attitude. Also with a dentist appointment first thing. Have you gone to the dentist when hungover? I do not recommend it.  There. That is my first advice of the day.

Once again, I’ll be tackling questions whenever I get a moment’s rest from That Other Job, The One That Pays Me Money For Shoes. New questions shall appear sporadically below, in reverse blog-order (newest on the bottom of the page, which is like the new equivalent to reading right to left).  So y’all have to scroll a lot, which is hard and leads to carpal tunnel syndrome and I am sorry, but I will not screw up my lovely journal-like, one-entry-per-day template for anybody.

Question #1, 1:01 pm

Dear Amalah,

How can one get such pretty, healthy teeth like yours?

Also, you are so very, very pretty and special and kissably cute.

Love, Amalah

Why thank you, Amalah. I bet you are pretty too. And you smell nice.

Anyway. Here are my patented 15 Steps To A More Beautiful Smile. Enjoy. And you are welcome.

1)  Have an appliance of some kind in your mouth at all times from the age of six on.
2)  Brush your teeth at least twice a day, preferably with a toothpaste that has sparkles in it. Because sparkle toothpaste = a sparkling smile. It’s a fact.
3)  Braces. They build character and promote slightly more responsible gum chewing. Also a fact.
4)  Wear your retainer post-braces. Maybe. Sometimes. At least consider it.
5)  Make a boy who sort of likes you retrieve your retainer from your school’s dumpster at least once.
6)  When you grow up, get over yourself and go to the dentist every six months already, for it will not kill you.
7)  Buy an electric toothbrush.
8)  Floss at least once a week and think very hard about flossing on days you don’t.
9)  Crest Whitestrips. For real.
10)  Find a dentist with the world’s most gentle hygienist who compliments your hair and your fine bone structure.
11)  Also find a dentist who is smart enough to notice that you, over a decade later, still have fucking CEMENT from your BRACES on your FRONT TEETH.
12)  Give shout-out to Crest Whitestrips for making this startling discovery possible.
13)  Have dentist scrape cement off teeth.
14)  Uncover flawless, perfect teeth unlike anything you ever thought possible.
15)  Profit.

Question #2, 1:39 pm

Dear Amalah,

Is it wrong of me to download fonts by the name of "Punk Assed Bitch" and "Porn Star Academy" just so that I can use them while writing letters to people like priests and teachers? For example, I'm using the "Satan Possessed" font to say things like "Please pray for me" and giggling endlessly while doing so.

Or, am I simply going to hell?

Or, am I simply losing my fuckin' mind?

Signed, Addicted to Typenow.net

Well THANK YOU VERY MUCH. Like I ALREADY DID NOT WASTE ENOUGH TIME ON THE INTERNET. Now I need to TOTALLY REDESIGN MY SITE just so I can use a bazillion different fonts.

Amalah.com is going be a NIGHTMARE of novelty fonts and will look like Typenow.net jest THREW UP ALL OVER IT.  This will be on your conscience. I hope you are happy.

And I hope you gave them some money for all your dirty downloading. Cleanse your font-related sins through the PayPal donate button and ye shall be atoned.

Also, I totally triple-dog dare you write a fan letter to Lisa Whelchel using the "Dimestore Hooker" font.

Question #3, 2:00 pm

dear amy,

i've been talking to the guy online for the last 3 weeks or so. we've been doing the email chatting thing and have been flirting back and forth. we've seen photos of each other and both of us have stated that on a scale of 1-10 in wanting to meet in person, we're both about an 8. he lives in the same town as i do. here is my question. he has my phone number and has had it for a few days, yet he only emails me and doesn't call. he says he wants to meet, but hasn't asked me out definitively. what gives? is he just out for a piece of a$$ as a friend suggested? and if so, don't we have to TALK first so that we can meet?

signed, been out of the game way too long.

(BOOTGWTL: Your question has been answered by a special guest advice question answerer, who answered a question last week and is now all uppity and thinks he has a regular gig now and should get a cut of the t-shirt sales or something. Although both weeks he has made me promise to pretend that I wrote the advice, because he is shy, and every week I have lied and pointed out that I did not write the advice. Anyway, dude needs a blog.)

(Oh, and I sent him this question because he has actually done the whole Internet dating thing, unlike me who got married young, so very young, back before there was an Internet. So I figured he'd provide real and useful advice.)

(I may be wrong about that.)

Dear Been Out of the Game Way Too Long (BOOTGWTL),

Excellent question. I think I can solve your dilemma. The reason he hasn't called is obvious-he can't talk. That's right. Dude's a mute.

Now I know you might think this might be a bad thing. But as Amalah always says," When life gives you lemons, take them and bash them in the face of your enemies." Whilst many people shy away from things like "fruit-induced brain damage," I prefer to see the silver lining. You see, having a man who can't talk really has lots of upside. When you get right down to it, why do men need to talk for anyway. They're just going to say something wrong. My Ken doll never talked, he seemed happy. A talking man is sorta like a sale at JC Penny's, or the Canadian army. Let's be honest, who's gonna miss it? What do men say? It's all "four score this," "ich bin that," "where's the remote."

Speaking of the remote. You can have lots of fun with him. Just point the remote at your cyber Harpo, hit the mute button and say "Ha Ha. I just muted you. Now PLAY!" Or if he gets mad at you, you can have fun "conversations."

Him: *Arms Flailing*

You: What's that? I can't HEAR you.

Him: *Arms Flailing*

You: What? You want to make crazy monkey love to me? All night long? Well (shrug) OK.

Both: *Flailing*

Question #4, 3:42 pm

Amy,

My son is completely, adorably cute. And it's not just my opinion, so I know it's not just a "face only a mother could love" type thing.

He goes to pre-k right now, and in 3 weeks, will be starting kindergarten. The girls in his pre-k class are already trying to kiss him. What do I do about the ho's who, in all their prostitutional glory, will be in his kindergarten class? I mean, seriously? The boy's only 5 fucking years old! And I'm just not ready for the girl thing to happen too!

Sincerely, Beth

As I read this question, I was immediately struck with another question. That question was, "What is the deal with my one eyebrow and why does it grow like that?"

Then I was struck with a third question, which was "What would Lisa Whelchel do?" And we all know that Lisa Whelchel would paraphrase, twist and utterly misinterpret the Bible to fit her own purposes.

So here, just for your little boy, I give you Proverbs 7, Revised Yet Again, The Gospel According to Amalah, Complete With Verse Annotations

1 Beth's son, keep my words and if you value your life,
2 Keep the Queen of Everything's commands. My law is the law, don’t you ever forget it, buster.
3 Write it down on Post-Its or tattoo it on your butt.
4 Say to wisdom, “You are my homie” and call understanding, “Amalah”
5 Listen to your mother and Carson Kressley for they will keep you away from the girls.
6 For from the E-Z Pass lane I looked through the car window,
7 And I saw a bunch of kindergarten boys
And one naïve young punk, in particular.
8 Passing along the street near the mall;
And entering through Sears, a dark and evil place,
9 just after dark, before all the stores closed because his mother is a coke whore.
10 And there a girl met him,
Wearing a SpongeBob SquarePants shirt that revealed her belly button and her heart.
11 She laughed way too loudly (trollop) and she was rarely at home with her parents because they were also coke whores.
12 She seemed to turn up everywhere, at the mall, the playground,
hanging out at friends' houses.
13 So she playfully hugged the young man and gave him a friendly kiss on the cheek.
And with a spunky yet feminist look she said to him,
14 “I just came from Sunday School and I played the part of a good girl, because I totally get off on corrupting you good little mama's boys,
15 I was hoping to see you there and when I didn’t see you
I came looking for you. I’m so glad I found you because we're playing hide-and-seek and you are It.
16 I have fixed up my room really cool with a Barbie bedspread.
17 I made a bunch of good smelling stuff from my E-Z Bake oven.
18 Why don’t you come over and we can watch some Olsen Twin videos and kiss.
19 My parents aren’t at home, they are away at a coke whore convention.
20 They won’t be back until Thurday because they never miss the Haiku Smackdown.”
21 With her convincing innocence, the dweeb bought it.
All it took was, “I’ve never met a guy who's potty trained before” and she had him.
22 He fell for it, hook, line and sinker.
23 Till he felt the hook in his mouth.
As a fish swimming for the worm,
He didn’t know it was a trap until it was too late.
It was the hook...of COOTIES.
24 Now, listen up kids, and listen up good.
I know what I’m talking about:
25 Don’t even look down that path.
If you don’t want to end up where the road is headed
Then stay on the sidewalk, or maybe better yet never go outside at all, but stay inside where your mommy can keep you safe from all the bad, bad, evil girls.
26 Girls have been the fall of many a strong young man.
Like Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs or that guy from Psycho who all had very healthy attitudes towards women that they got from listening to their mothers because Mother Is Always Right And Doesn't Want To Stay In The Basement, You Bad, Naughty Boy.

Anyway, maybe you should homeschool him too, just to be doubly safe.

Question #5, 4:36 pm

Dear QofE,

Please tell me how not to hit people in the face when they assume - because of my Canadian status - that I a) have no class, b) append "eh?" to every sentence and c) live in an igloo.

Thanks, Montrealer

P.S. Love your site.  Très pretty.

Dude, what is the deal with curling? And why couldn't I stop watching it during the last Winter Olympics?

I was in Canada once. In Ontario. It was cold and I almost missed my flight and completely burst into tears at the airport when they told me I was only on standby because my job's corporate travel agent fucked up my reservation and that job laid me off like, a month later even though I was very nearly stranded in Canada on account of that damn job. I also got food poisoning there from some undercooked chicken.

And I have some vague memories of being at a strip club and someone buying me a lapdance. The stripper smelled really nice.

So the next time someone says something like that to you? Just tell them that your strippers smell way better than ours. Ours are skanky.

(Also, I just realized my guest advice-giver person insulted your army. I am sorry.)

(Do you have an army?)

Question #6, 4:49 pm

Dear Amalah, giver of excellent advice,

About three months ago, I decided to go on yet another diet. For the first 8 weeks, I was Sarah, eater of lettuce, prime example of willpower. I lost 10lbs no problem. Lettuce was my best friend. We would have sleepovers and talk shit about cheeseburgers and fried chicken.

About 8 weeks in, I was walking down a street in NY and a vendor of hotdogs lured me in and i ate a rat dog and I'm pretty sure it was drugged. Because since then? Food talks to me. I am not the crazy.
Cheeseburgers are like, "Come here sexy, you know you want a bite of me" and meatballs are all like "Look at us, so round, so delectable, you know you want to pop us in your mouth." The list could go on and on. On Sunday at a picnic the meatballs spoke so loudly that I ate 45 of them and their extended family. So, help, make the food voices stop.  By the way, I'm sorry if I emailed the wrong address.

Thank you in advance, Sarah

I would just like to say that the subject line of Sarah's email was "Make the meatballs stop talking."

I'll give you a minute to recover.

The first rule of the Wednesday Advice Smackdown? I bring the funny to the Wednesday Advice Smackdown. When you start getting all uppity and funnier than me? I keel you. Or maybe I'll just pout a little.

Either way, I totally won't answer your question, but will instead use it as a springboard to bring the conversation back to being solely about ME. Me me me me me. The funny one, over here, making the funny face for the camera and who TOTALLY could have come up with a visual EVERY BIT AS FUNNY as talking meatballs if you'd just let her think about it for a minute.

I would like a Snickers bar right about now.

Anyway. I feel the diet pain. Mr. Amalah and I have been doing the South Beach Diet thing, sort of, for awhile now.

(DUDES. I JUST REALIZED THAT WE ARE GOING TO SOUTH BEACH FOR OUR VACATION. THAT IS WEIRD. WEEEEIRD. THAT DIET IS A CULT THAT IS AFFECTING OUR TRAVEL PLANS. RUN!)

The first two weeks of South Beach? Food definitely talks to you. Potatoes cry out; soft cushiony bread tempts you with its yeasty deliciousness. Alcohol weeps for you. Sugar taunts you from the bowl like an oasis of pure, uncut cocaine.

Then it gets progressively easier. I've totally lost my taste for french fries and potato chips. We broiled some sweet potato fries the other night that were very yummy. I really could care less that I'm eating hamburgers on whole wheat rolls now. It's hard to get worked up over fried foods when freaking filet mignons are allowed and encouraged.  Low-fat cheese is still cheese with cheesy goodness. I put Splenda in my coffee and drink that C2 Coke and can't tell the difference anymore.

And I'm down to (get ready to hate me) 122 pounds. I am wee! I am a pixie! I am alienating all my readers!

Jason bought me a very pretty outfit from Banana Republic? And the top was a small? And it was too big. Like huge. And I returned it and got the extra-small and Jason said the most wonderful words I have ever heard: "What HAPPENED to you? You're so SKINNY!"

This is me in the outfit. It is blurry because I looked so totally hot I literally made Jason tremble while taking the picture.

No, not really. He forgot the flash. But I like this one better than the flash version because blurry is so flattering. Plus my arms looked fat in the other one.

HOLY CRAP PEOPLE. I am tired of giving all this amazing advice. And I still have like, five more questions to go. Make it stop!

Also, I am becoming a serious brat and would like to smack MYSELF down after that last question, because that just took self-aggrandizing to a new and scary place. Shut up, Amy.

Sarah just sent me a picture of a talking meatball. Oh yes.

Question #7, 6:20 pm

Dear Amalah,

I was reading various "DON'T EVER HAVE LASIX BECAUSE YOUR EYES WILL ROT" promotional websites and then I went back to check on your advice post and apparently I have already had the vision-wrecking surgery, because that picture of you is waaaay blurry.  You DO look fabulous, but oh-so-blurry.

Also, I so want to take you to Krispy Kreme right this very minute.

That is all.

Mir

I would so like to go to Krispy Kreme with you right this very minute. For there is a drive-thru Krispy Kreme right by my office that has this monstrous red beacon that they light up when the donuts have just been made. Sort of like the Grail-Shaped Beacon from Monty Python that wicked, bad, naughty, evil Zoot lit to attract Sir Galahad the Pure.

Oh my god. ZOOT. I get it now. Unless that's not what she meant. But if is? Fucking brilliant.

Give me a donut.

Dear Amalah,

What is an appropriate wedding gift for a person you don't really like?

Loave, Coleen

The worst gift we received was a big-ass serving platter shaped like a fish. It was this yellowish-brown colored glass and basically looked like one of those novelty singing bass things in platter form.

We gave it away as a gag gift to someone. I bet it is still being re-gifted out there. You should find it and give that. Then post their thank-you card on the Internet, because it doesn't matter that you gave them a big-ass serving platter shaped like a fish, they still have to thank you for it. Haaaa.

Question #8, 6:30 pm

Here's my question: So how do I go about getting more people to read my blog? Aside from the obvious writing something interesting, of course. I mean, I've gone this long without doing that; why change
things midstream?

Do I even want the general public reading it?

-Mary B.

Of COURSE you want the general public reading your blog. There is no greater sense of validation than having a swarm of minions out there to do your bidding and buy CDs because you say so and to tell you that you're pretty on command. It's like having your own little bunch of trained seals, really.

I have a lovely group of readers. They are pretty and they do what I tell them to and they kiss my everlovin' ass at a moment's notice. I got them all in 10 Easy Steps To Improving Your Readership and Readying Your Own Army:

1) Latch onto a more successful site like a leech. Comment like crazy. Trick blogger into linking to you a lot.
2) Rinse, Repeat.
3) Adopt a stance like you totally don't care if anyone reads you because frankly, you are better than everyone. Incorporate this into your design. Come up with a clever tagline that asserts your massive ego. This makes everyone think you are super-cool and they want to be friends with you and maybe buy you things.
4) Form a posse of like-minded individuals. Make fun of everyone else.
5) Register for JournalCon.
6) Threaten to quit writing or change in some way so everybody will comment and tell you "NOT TO OMFG I LOVE YOU PLEASE DON'T EVER GO AWAY I WOULD CRY."
7) Post pictures of self. Watch the male readers crawl out of woodwork.
8) Meet other bloggers in person. Sure, it's risky since they may murder you, but if it cements the idea that you are part of some Secret Inner Circle of Cool People, it's worth it.
9) Don't ever, ever let your readers see you refer to them as a bunch of trained seals.
10) Profit.

Question #god-knows-what, 6:55 pm

My Dearest Amy,

I have read your advice pimping of the Crest Whitestrips.  I will back you up in your love of the results that they provide in the form of sparkly white chompers.  But, the thing is, I just can't stand to wear them.  And those Crazy Crest people?  They expect you to do it TWICE PER DAY for half an hour each time.  Fine, I can slap one on while I'm taking a shower and getting ready in the morning -- the shower distracts me a bit from that semi-icky taste that they leave in my mouth and from the feeling that I daren't move my lips even the tiniest bit because that might dislodge the strip of whiteness.  But after that?  I don't have a lot of spare time in which to whiten. Because they tell you you can't eat or drink with the strip in.  And all of my free time in the evening after I return home from work is spent drinking wine.  What's a girl to do?

-Martha

Holy crap, I'm tired. (Hey look! Reruns!)

You know, I loave the Crest Whitestrips, but I do not kill myself if I don't use them twice a day, every damn day. It's like flossing. I've found that on the days you don't use them? Just stare REALLY HARD at the box and THINK about using them. I think that's good enough.

Question #five billion and four, hours and hours later after Question #1

Dear Amy,

How does one prevent oneself from eating the entire contents of the office vending machine?  I've tried asking my officemates to make fun of me every time I go down the hall, but they're all sort of afraid I
might actually rip their heads off.

Don't even try some silly advice like "use will power," or "don't bring loose change to work," either.

Signed, It has Spicy AND BBQ Chips!

Am...so...hungry. Fucking...South...Beach...Diet...and for the love...of...carbs...bring me potato chips...both flavors. Plus...sour cream & onion. And a Snickers.

And where's Mir with my donut?

This Post Has No Pictures At All

Sorry about that. It’s all reading and words. But don’t worry, I don’t use any big words.

And I seriously have the attention span of a gnat today.  A drunk gnat.

We’re going to Miami! South Beach. In two weeks. A last-minute little getaway for our anniversary. Six years. SIX. We’re on two hands now. We’ll be using our toes to count the years soon.

HAVE YOU EVER WONDERED ABOUT P/E RATIOS?

Of course you have. Here, I wrote this today and would like to share it:

That’s the forward P/E ratio, and there’s no need to worry about figuring it our yourself…Yahoo Finance has it for you!  If you go to Yahoo and enter a quote, you’ll see a P/E ratio come up with all the other basics, but this is not the one you want. That’s the “trailing P/E ratio” which is talking about PAST earnings history, not future earnings potential.

If you are talking about the company’s estimated earnings for this year, you’re talking about the FUTURE earnings, so you want the “forward P/E ratio.”  From the basic quote page at Yahoo, click on “Key Statistics” from the left-hand column. In the top box you’ll see the forward P/E ratio. Take that number.

For example, I have a quote open now for Microsoft. If I look at the forward P/E, Yahoo gives it as 20.50.  I would then say that MSFT is trading at 20X its 2004 estimated earnings.

I apologize for the above. While it’s one thing to not have anything to write about, it’s something completely different to purposely torture your audience just because you felt like cutting-and-pasting something.

A NOTE TO ALL THE BRAVE WOMEN COMING HERE EXPECTING SOME SORT OF MOTHERLY WANTINGS AND ROLE MODELSHIP:

I have been added to Julie’s Big Ass Page Of Infertile People Who Write Things On The Internet. 

See?

And while this thrills me beyond belief (Traffic! Hits! Julie knows I exist!), it also makes me sad, sad, sad.

I was supposed to be all pregnant and fat by now, but I am not. I am skinny and get drunk a lot. This should be a good thing, but it’s not.

(Has anyone ever managed to get your period at the exact moment you've chosen to take a pregnancy test? I have. Am talented. Am also pathetic, because I still stared at that blood-stained pee stick for a minute and a half to make sure the results window said negative.)

(All male readers have just fled screaming from the room.)

Anyway, I hate Clomid, because it Did Not Work and it was Supposed To Work. So now what? IUI? Other various injectables that will leave me bruised and hormonal and riddled with The Crazy? $10,000 IVF cycles? Black-market babies?  Another cat?

My next-door neighbor is about to have baby number two. Guess when we started trying? Back before baby number one. I found myself spilling this information to her right after congratulating her on the second pregnancy.

"Congratulations!  Wow, number two. So soon? Really? Well, I guess she IS coming up on two years old…but you know you’re not the only grown-ups in the building who would like to be all responsible and shit because we’re trying but it’s not working because I’m defective and I’d appreciate it if you stopped flaunting your own glorious fertility all over the place, thank you very much."

Blah. Am a bitch.

Number of questions I have received for tomorrow’s advice column: 0

ZERO. What, I don’t look like someone who can be relied upon to fix your stupid problems?  What, you want your advice columnist to have functioning ovaries and mental stability all of a sudden?

Everyone raise your hands if you are sick of that little divider thing and wish I would stop thinking it's cute and stop being too lazy to write a cohesive, well-thought-out, non-MTV-generation-type post.

Yeah? Well. It's hormones...or something. Step off.

IF YOU THINK I AM CAPABLE OF MORE INTELLIGENT THOUGHTS THAN THESE, YOU ARE WRONG, MISTER

A conversation with Chris:

amalah: you think that three-squash soup from last thursday is still good?
amalah: I’ve had it in the fridge
amalah: (I'm such a child.)
chris: not sure about that but there’s one way to find out!
amalah: Here! Smell this for me!
chris: I'm the same way with food and stuff
chris: sniff sniff...mmm, three squash!
amalah: hmmm...I think it’s down to about two and a half squash
amalah: squashes?
amalah: squashi?
chris: I was just thinking that
amalah: squashes doesn't look right. It's a verb
chris: yeah, that doesn't seem quite right to me either...just squash?
amalah: i think so
chris: like fish
chris: fish and squash
amalah: one squash, two squash, red squash, blue squash
chris: LOL
chris: Dr. Squasheuss
chris: Horton Hears A Squash
amalah: To Think That I Saw It On Squashberry Street
chris: Hop On Squash
amalah: Green Eggs and Squash
chris: There's a Squash In My Pocket
chris: Yertle the Squash
amalah: How the Squash Stole Christmas
chris: Squash in Socks
amalah: Did I Ever Tell You How Squashy You Are?
chris: Thidwick and the Big Hearted Squash
chris: (obviously I'm cheating, for I have gone to Amazon)
amalah: (me too)

(EDITED TO ADD: If you would like a post with pictures, I advise you to go HERE.)

"Weekend" -- A Musical Extravaganza In Three Acts

Am back. Y’all missed me, right?

Well, not really, Amy. You never update over the weekend so I don’t even bother to come visit and was only vaguely aware that you were somewhere besides sitting on your own couch all weekend.

Miserable bastards.

Oh yeah, I totally missed you. Bitch.

(stony silence)

Ok, ok. Please tell me all about your frigging weekend already. Post some pictures and then shut the hell up.

Thank you!  I had a lovely weekend, actually. It was quite busy. But right now I’m having that “oh shit oh shit oh shit” feeling that comes from taking a WHOLE DAY OFF from work and then coming back to HOLY MOTHER OF STARBUCKS TORNADO O’ WORK PANIC PANIC SHIT SHIT SHIT.

Also, the CAPS lock key! I missed you, CAPS lock key! I brought you some taffy.

I am really, at this point, just trying to remember to keep up with the breathing.

WEEKEND, PART ONE, THE FIRST

I drove up to Pennsylvania on Friday morning-ish. It was an uneventful drive, except for the eventful parts. All of which involved my E-Z Pass.

Now usually I would have great contempt for “E-Z” anything. But I love my E-Z Pass. You have your own special little lane at tolls that you drive through and you never, ever have to worry about having dollars. Because I never have dollars.

(Seriously. My lunch on Thursday was completely ruined by a BITCH coffee and sandwich place that was not Starbucks that would not let me charge an iced coffee because of some stupid $5 minimum charge policy.)

Anyway. E-Z Pass is great. You occasionally get the morons who drive in the E-Z Pass lane and don’t realize it until the last minute, but these people are not the fault of the E-Z Pass.

I drive through three tolls on my way to my parents’ house. Two in Maryland, one in Delaware. I drove through the first toll and the light didn’t turn green. It turned red, then yellow, which confused me. Do I…drive?  With caution? Did I pay the toll? With caution?

I figured maybe I drove through too fast. But the same thing happened at the next toll. And since I am a Good Girl who is terrified of the words “toll violator” but who is also helpless and wussy, I called Jason and ordered him to call the E-Z Pass people and yell at them.

But he was busy doing work stuff so I decided to be a grown-up.  At the Delaware toll I pulled into the “E-Z Pass Customer Service” building, and walked in and asked for some E-Z Pass Customer Service. Except that I was a Maryland E-Z Pass Customer, and therefore was ineligible for E-Z Pass Customer Service in Delaware.

Fucking Delaware.

So I get back in the car and drive through the regular toll, with all the regular people, and I hold out two lone dollars I managed to find in my purse. The toll lady ignores me completely, so I hold them out higher and wave them a little bit. She says something to me that I cannot hear at all. Here is the rest of the story:

Toll Booth Bitch:  *mumble mumble kvetch*

Amy: What? Also, look, dollars!

Toll Booth Bitch: *mumble mumble E-Z Pass*

Amy: (takes a wild guess) Yes, I know my E-Z Pass is not working. Here. Doll. Ars.

Toll Booth Bitch: YOUR E-Z PASS PAID.

Amy: (thoroughly confused now) What? But it hasn’t been working right at the last two…

Toll Booth Bitch:  I DON’T FUCKING CARE, YOUR FUCKING E-Z PASS PAID NOW DRIVE ALREADY.

Amy: (mouth drops open, gets the big and watery Precious Moments eyes)

Amy: (recovers) 

Amy: OH SHUT THE FUCK UP ALREADY YOU BITCH.

WEEKEND, PART ONE, THE SECOND

Dad and I went to a Phillies game Friday night after it miraculously stopped raining humungous buckets of water.

I sat behind a woman who had the largest head ever. We called her Big Giant Head. Her husband? Next to her? Not a small man himself.

Luckily we got to move over so the game was not obscured by Big Giant Head anymore.

The three stages of baseball, as played by Amy and Amy’s Dad:

1) At the game, but before any beer.

2) At the game, after beer, after the home team scored.

3) At the game, after several beers, after the home team completely blew it.

Yes, the Phillies lost. Congratulations Chicago. And to any Chicago readers, please know that I mean absolutely no offense when I say that Chicago Cubs fans have no sense of humor, are mostly ugly and also smell bad.

But they do have normal-sized heads. I will give you that.

And oh! We were on TV! For real!  A whole bunch of people saw us and called my mom to tell her about it. V. exciting. Actually, most people only recognized my dad. Obviously, I have not posted enough damn pictures of myself on the Internet.

WEEKEND, PART TWO, THE FIRST AND ONLY

On Saturday I went shopping with my mom. I bought many things. Many, many things.

But the only picture I have of that day is this:

That’s a garbage can at the mall’s food court. It fucking TALKS to you. It says, “Thank you!” after you put garbage in it.

I thought maybe if you waved your hands in front of it the flap would open for you so you could avoid touching the germy trash flap. That would sort of make sense. But it does not. It just thanks you for your donation of trash.

It would also be cool if it yelled at you for throwing away recyclables. Or maybe snapped closed on your hand if you were wasting food. But no. ‘Tis a stupid trash can. But polite!

WEEKEND, PART THREE, THE FIRST

On Sunday, it was the long-awaited and much-hyped meeting of the JLB Philly girls. It was fun. FUN. And you were not invited. Better luck next time!

Aren’t we pretty?  Say we are pretty.

WEEKEND, PART THREE, THE SECOND

After brunch I called:

1)  My mother, to let her know that Coleen and Diana were, in fact, exactly who they claimed to be and were not 45-year-old gang members who lured me to brunch to keel me or sell me into white slavery over eBay.

2)  Jason, to let him know that I’d be home in about two hours. Maybe two and a half.

Like four hours later? Was still on the road.

My E-Z Pass was working correctly again, but it was not such the timesaver this time because Delaware only had one E-Z Pass lane open.

Fucking Delaware.

Also light drizzle in Maryland means you must go verrrrry slowly lest you go careening around a slight bend on 95 and lose control completely and end up in a ditch and die. In fact, it’s better if you put your car in neutral and just sort of coast home. You’ll get there eventually.

WEEKEND, PART THREE, THE THIRD

I am in love with Bed Head After-Party. I have been searching for this product my entire life.

Too bad it sort of looks like a sex toy of some kind. I mean, I don’t love it like that. Except that I totally do.

 

 

Packing Diary II: The Packening

Going on a little trip, chickies. Tomorrow morning I head on out to Pennsylvania to visit with the parental units.

Dad and I are going to a Phillies game; Mom and I are going to spend money and buy shoes. Everyone's a winner!

AND AND AND then? On Sunday? I shall be brunching with Coleen and Diana in Philadelphia, which shall temporarily be renamed the City of Brotherly Loave in our honor. And we are totally bringing a picture of Judith Light to prop up on an empty chair and talk to like she is really there with us.

Because she will be. In our hearts. And in our crazy, crazy brains.

Anyway. Since I forgot to give y'all any warning of my departure and don't want anybody to panic when I don't update tomorrow and notify the authorities because oh, my god, she surely must be dead, I figured I would plagiarize from myself and do another packing diary -- a gimmick that sort of worked once so therefore must be beaten into the ground, shot and run over with a car by doing it again.

(That sentence was a bazillion words long. My head hurts now.)

6:30 p.m.  At work. Horrible, terrible, not-so-good work.

6:31  Fuck this. FUCK THIS.

6:33 Am totally leaving. Yes.

6:38  No.

6:55  Really leaving.

7:02  Really really leaving.

7:40  Home.

7:41 - 8:06  Rant about day.

8:07  Rant. Rant rant.

8:08  Must pack. Yes.

8:09  Get out suitcase. Cause small closet avalanche.

8:10  Order husband to order food. Fooooood. Indian food. Yes.

8:12  Realize one fingernail is starting to break. No!  Noooo. Paint. File. Pray.

8:14  Bite nail off.

8:15  Look for Saturday and Sunday Care Bear underwear.  Find Saturday's. Are dirty. EW!

8:16  Have seriously had dirty pair of panties in drawer with clean ones since last Saturday?  Who AM I? Dirty, dirty girl, that's who.

8:25  Terribly productive. Huge pile of clothes on bed is a very good short list of options of things I might possible want to take.

8:26  Pull cat off clothes.

8:27  Phillies hat!  And red shirt!  Wooooo! Go Phils!

8:29  Should bring bridesmaid dress found on eBay.  Perhaps Mom can alter it for free as a seamstress would probably charge more than damn dress cost in the first place.

8:30  Realize one tank top, upon which all other outfits depend, is in wash.

8:31  Order husband to go pick up food already. Am cranky.

8:34  Hate all clothes. Why does it always come to this?

8:36  Tank top is NOT in wash. WTF?

8:38  Mistake lacy garter belt for elusive tank top for the seventh time.

8:39  Ponder the many things that are sort of wrong with that.

8:43  Entire summer wardrobe is mashed into wee suitcase.

8:44  Should probably bring some warm stuff too in case it gets cold.

8:45  Like it so often does in JULY. Shut up, Amy.

8:50  FOOOOOOOOD.

8:51  AND WIIIIIIINNNNEEE.

8:52  Dinner is served. Crystal wine glasses brought out, as are paper towels because we are out of napkins. Plates are provided, but opt instead to eat right out of plastic container. Lit candles though.

8:54  Also realize am not wearing pants.

10:03  Totally over the packing. Over.

10:05  Which is different than being done with the packing. Very different.

10:06  HOLY SHIT, THERE IS A HELICOPTER HOVERING RIGHT OUTSIDE MY WINDOW. OH MY GOD. MY NEXT-DOOR NEIGHBORS ARE AL-QUEDA OR THERE IS ANTHRAX IN THE INDIAN FOOD.

10:08  Never mind. Helicopter was far away. Was reflection of ceiling fan in window.

10:09  Need more wine. Promptly.

10:12  Soooo almost tripped on the stairs and fell on my ass.

10:13  Still not wearing pants.

10:14  Still wondering where that damn tank top is. Going to bug me all weekend now.

10:17  Have not packed toiletries, shoes or the baby spider plant I promised my mom.

10:18  When did I last water the spider plant?  Or look at it?

10:20  Uh oh. Aren't plants supposed to be green?

10:21  Water plants. Water!  Life-giving water!  Live babies!  I care for you!  I do not forget you!

10:23  Will be horrible, terrible mother someday.

10:24  Although Max certainly ain't lacking a blessed thing in the world.

10:25 Except a clean litter box. Ew.

10:26  Wonder if blue and white linen skirt is better outfit than cream and brown striped one. Jason doesn't want to hear about it any more.

10:28  I wonder if anyone is online?

10:29  MIR! MIR! MIR!

10:34  There is a GNAT in my WINE.

10:35  That is gross, and yet what a glorious death that would be.

10:47  This post would have been funnier if I were drunker. Ooof. Glass hit teeth.

10:53  Loave Mir.

10:56  I don't think I shall pack anymore tonight.

11:00 Hope Coleen and Diana don't make fun of me when I show up on Sunday in the wrong tank top, a sweater for some reason and quite likely, no pants.

We Don't Need No Effin' Cohesion

TODAY'S FREAKOUT, BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE NUMBER ELEVEN:

Hey, anybody remember last week? When I had seven special report things to write for work? And how much I complained about it?

Am stupid girl. Drama queen. I know NOT of what I speak.

Next week? Eleven reports. E. LEV. EN. 

And I won't actually have a week this time. I really have about four days. What's four divided by eleven? Or I am supposed to divide eleven by four? Or is that the same thing? How in the world have I not been fired yet?

Yes, it's back. I missed it, actually.

TODAY'S THE GREATEST GIFT OF ALL, BROUGHT TO YOU BY MIR:

So a little something arrived in the mail yesterday. Something that could really ever only be addressed to me.

Yes. That is a tote bag that says Queen of Everything on it. Look at the marvelous detail.

So thank you to Mir (what's that link? Mir? Mir?), for not only the perfect bag for announcing my superiority to everyone, but for also giving me an idea for this year's Halloween costume.

TODAY'S LAME-ASS PHOTO ESSAY, BROUGHT TO YOU BY MY OWN FILTHY FILTH:

Poor Chris. He certainly took a thrashing in Tuesday's post. I mean, there once was a time when you could go out for lunch with a friend and not have to worry about your nasty, dirty cupholders ending up on the Internet. Those days are past. Especially if that friend is me.

But! Let he who is without filth cast the first stone! The rest of you, get in line behind him! Amalah? Back of the line, toots.

I present to you, my coffee table. (At a special artsy angle, too!)

This is not a cupholder. This is where I LIVE. This is where I put my feet up. And also where I eat dinner a lot of the time, which has only now occurred to me as being really, really gross.

Just what is some of that crap? Well, let's do a quick inventory, starting in the top left corner and going clockwise:

Blank DVDs for pirating movies, topped off with a copy of the Jenna Lewis Survivor sex tape, blank CDs for pirating music, my birthday card that Jason forgot to give me in December and gave me on Tuesday, the case for Carbon Leaf's live CD (empty), a burned-out and busted wireless network card, the case for Carbon Leaf's Echo Echo CD (empty), the box and manual for our new wireless network card, shit from work that I brought home and ignored, keys, a rum and coke, an empty wine glass, an empty wine bottle, TiVo remote, plates from dinner, Jason's cell phone, stamps, another rum and coke, another empty wine glass, a Gladware container of soy nuts, the manual for our new camera (in Spanish).

Also strewn about: sharp scissors, more remotes, Post-Its, random bits of Important Trash, hair clips, sunglasses, matches, my collection of nail polish, catalogs, shoes, mail, and Max's Puppy.

This is Puppy.

Max loves Puppy. Puppy is loved. Puppy gets the living shit kicked out of him on every occasion. Puppy is hanging on by a thread.

AND ONE MORE, BECAUSE I LIKE WHEN PEOPLE TELL ME I'M PRETTY:

This is me, surprisingly not on drugs, just with smeary eyeliner.

"Yes, I know I should be cleaning off the coffee table, Jason, but I'd really prefer to just hang out on the couch, over here, by your pants."

The Wednesday Advice Smackdown

SAME GARBAGE, MORE WORDS, LESS CAFFEINE

Holy crap, I’m tired. Sorry for the delay in today’s advice spectacular, but I was kind of hoping the Sprinkles/Jimmies war would lead to some violence. Instead, it's just getting embarassing for just about everybody involved. Way too many intelligent adults making "jimmy hat" jokes. Which are funny. But. Still.

Also, I have been waiting ALL DAMN DAY for the office coffee maker to get fixed. Yes, that is right. FIXED.

It’s some complicated coffee-packet-filtration system thing from Gevalia, and today it had a big OUT OF ORDER sign taped over it. I am not ashamed to tell you that I did not handle this well. I may have cursed, and for that I am sorry, especially since that new girl who doesn’t know me was standing right there. New Girl, I am sorry.

I am also sorry for saying those bad things about the mother of the Baby Jesus. That was completely unnecessary.

And I am sorry for the crappy advice I have yet to dispense.

I think that is all the corrections, retractions and apologies for today, so let’s get started. (Wait, one more. I am sorry for stealing that from The Daily Show.)

Dear Amalah,

Why is housing in D.C. so damn expensive?  Are they padding the carpet with benjamins or something?

Dawn

Well, that only happens if you’re buying Marion Barry’s old house.

*rim shot*

Sorry about that. That didn’t even really make sense. Marion Barry’s house would just have crack hidden in the insulation.

*crickets chirping*

Holy crap, I’m tired.

Either way, I love my city and all, but the housing prices are awful damn uppity for being built on a fucking swamp. Seriously. You can just come live in my guest room. I will only charge you $1,750 a month in rent (plus utilities and some light housekeeping), and frankly, I dare you to find a better deal in this town.

Dear Amalah (the Wise and Wonderful),

I am very sad.  John Mayer wrote an article for Esquire magazine where he itemizes his AmEx statement and even though I understand that he's trying to air his DNA stained laundry before someone else does, I don't think he knows how this hurts me.  That was ME having phone sex with him!!  How can he just throw out all we had like it was just a number?  Doesn't he know how special that was?  I mean, he told me my body was a wonderland and everything!

And now I'll only eve be 'that girl who had phone sex with John Mayer' and I wanted to be so much more.  Did Anna Nicole ever have such set-backs in her career?

-Candi Cane, Frontier Girl #693

EXCERPT FROM ARTICLE IN QUESTION:
4/30/04: FRONTIER*CALLUS $1,563.25
Being a rock star means having any girl you want, anywhere, anytime. That's why from January 1 to April 30, I spent more than $1,500 on phone sex. The bulkiest charge occured at the tail end of New Year's Eve, which sounds about right, being that I stayed home to water the humidifiers in my guitar cases."

Holy crap, I’m tired. You know how tired I am? I sent this question to someone else and ordered him to answer it. You don’t know him. He told me to take all the credit. But I cannot, because you know the sort of Crazy that does shit like that.

Anyway, here is perhaps, the best answer of the day. It’s like, researched and shit. This is an answer from someone who Has Not Given Up. Someone who Still Gives A Rat’s Ass. Someone who should start his own damn journal, and stop showing off on mine.

Oh Candi,

For the love of carbs, that is no set back, honey. Not. At. All. Remember, this is the Naugths’ (or the zeros, or whatever the frick else we’re calling this decade). If you play your cards right, this is your meal ticket.

Here’s your game plan. First, you have to lose any and all feelings. Reading Esquire is a good start. So, well done there. You may also want to consider grad school.

Also, here’s a little secret that only Amalah knows about: Guess what Mr. Sensitive used to do before he was Mr. Sensitive? (see paragraph 4).

That’s right, he was a phone sex operator. Not that I ever called. (Much.) So you see, it didn’t hold back his career when he was “soooo in love” with me. It’s not like he’s playing the prom.

Dear Amalah:

Best post-"Growing Pains" career of the entire cast. Also feel free to cover "Who's the Boss?", "Different World", and "L.A. Law".

-Coleen

Holy crap. I’m tired. And this is a loaded question. You think I didn’t learn my lesson after the whole Saved By The Bell vs. 90210 fiasco from a few weeks ago? I got LETTERS, people. Angry ones. Because y’all are crazy.

Anyway. I will cover Growing Pains this week, and that’s it. Feel free to resubmit the other three and any other classic sitcoms, especially ones like Cheers, M*A*S*H and Small Wonder, because those rock and I know lots about them.

THE CAST OF GROWING PAINS: WHERE ARE THEY NOW, ACCORDING TO ME AND ALSO THE IMDB:

Alan Thicke

Well. He’s still alive. I will give you that.

He was the host of Miracle Pets, which I actually did watch once. It was miraculous. If by “miraculous” you mean “lots of old people get rescued from fires by their dogs who probably just wanted food, and also your cat did NOT dial 911 to save your ass, you fucking liar.”

He was also in Lamb Chop’s Chanukah Surprise, which I did not see, and for that I am glad. Also: Betrayal of the Dove (1991), Rubdown (1993) and the underrated “Not Quite Human” trilogy, including Not Quite Human II and Still Not Quite Human. I hear Peter Jackson borrowed heavily from these to make the Lord of the Rings movies.

Alan is currently filming Growing Pains II: Home Equity. Contrary to what you might think, this is a TV movie, not a theatrical release. Yes.

Joanna Kerns

Also alive. Also directing Growing Pains II: Home Equity. Yes.

She was apparently in Girl, Interrupted, which I really liked, because it had lots of The Crazy in it. Also incest and screaming and angst. I do not remember Joanna’s role. Perhaps it would have been more memorable if she had jumped naked off the hospital roof claiming to fly or thrown feces at Winona. That would have been cool. 

She was also in something called No Dessert Dad, Til You Mow the Lawn, and oh my god, if anyone out there has a copy of this I order you to send it to me immediately. Because that sounds so awesome. It also starred Robert Hays.

Kirk Cameron

DUDE. Did you know that Kirk attempted his own sitcom in 1995? Called Kirk? And do you know it was directed by SCOTT BAIO?

I am not even kidding. How did that fail? How?

Anyway. The only other thing of note that Kirk has done is to set up his own creepy religious Web site, a la Blaire Warner. Shudder.

Tracey Gold

Ew. Her IMDB profile is too full of stuff like Stolen Innocence, Dirty Little Secret, She’s No Angel and Wildfire 7: The Inferno for me to spend any time discussing her career. It’s just…sad.

Props for overcoming the eating disorder though!*

*Dudes, I am so not making fun of eating disorders. Well, I am, but not, because I have Been There, Done That, Have Several T-Shirts and The Lifetime of Irregular Periods. So…chill.

Leonardo Dicaprio

Yeah, I think this about answers your question. Although I fucking hated Titanic and wish bad things on all those involved with it, particularly Celine Dion. I will still give you that Leo is a pretty damn good actor, especially one who started his career acting opposite the rest of these clowns.

Dear Amalah,

I sleep way too much. I just can't help it. I need at least 14 hours of sleep a night, then a post breakfast catnap, followed by a few zzz in the mid-afternoon. Sometimes I get in another little snooze after the Simpsons and before dinner. Sleep sleep sleep sleep sleep. And not only do I sleep a lot (did I mention 14 hours?) but I just drop off at the drop of a hat. I just lie down all snuggly under the covers and in a few seconds I'm off in Dreamland. I never have to lie there and stare at the ceiling or poke my husband's toes or do push-ups. Can you help me with this terrible *yawn* affliction?

Your Friend,
Well Rested

FUCK YOU.

Holy crap, I’m tired.

 

 

 

Want to see your hilarious question wasted? Do you have a beautiful comic setup for me that you'd like to see me totally drop the ball on? Then send it on to advice@amalah.com and then tune in next Wednesday for more of a great gimmick gone horribly awry!

Please Report to the Amalah's Office

Good afternoon, lovelies.

I am calm and collected today, and only barely on the verge of a spaz attack of some kind. So does that mean this entry will be boring? Possibly. But there are pictures! Pictures are not boring.

Unless they are pictures of my office, which they totally are, so yes. Boring.

(I still have not stopped with the new camera love. I mean, it is SO TINY. And I PUSH A BUTTON and it TAKES A PICTURE. I will NEVER QUIT with the LOVE for this CAMERA.)

Well, I will for awhile, because the battery just died. So no more pictures today. But that is okay, because I already took like, four dozen to bore you with.

Also, I just drank a lot of Coke at lunch. And then a venti iced coffee. (Venti is Italian for "fucking huge ass coffee.") So I am a bit jiiiiittttttttttttttery. Jiiiiittttttt. Ery. I like holding keys down. iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii.  Especially the i key. It's very satisfying.

You know what else is satisfying? A good night's sleep. Not like I would know right now, because my darling husband caught my insomnia last night. Allllllll night. I woke up around 3 am because the man was doing PUSH-UPS in our BEDROOM. I yelled at him or threw a pillow at him or something, because then he went downstairs and left comments on all the Judith Light Brigade sites.

The man is strange, yo. And then? To add insult to injury? He worked from home today? Because he was so tired? And he emailed THIS to me:

Bastard. But oh my god, he's so cute.

He also, apparently, took a picture of my near-naked ass with the new camera last night. Which I was not aware of. Until I started going through the pictures on it today and was confronted with a close-up of my own butt.  Nice. The only thing that would have been nicer, frankly, would have been if I had discovered that picture while showing someone ELSE the new camera. Like, my boss, for instance. Or Chris.

Because Chris and I had lunch today. Yes. Which is where I drank all the Coke and then decided a venti venti venti was in order. I forgot to take pictures though, except for these, which are of the cup holders in his car.

Seriously. Click on that there thumbnail, chickies, and just BEHOLD that horror. I believe those are jimmies (or "sprinkles" for those of you unfamiliar with the proper phraseology) from donuts. Many, many donuts. The crumpled up receipt is from me, because I am Rude.

Anyway.

So Jason is at home snuggled up with my gorgeous, precious cat, Chris is wallowing in his own filth, and I? Am here.

This is my office. That is my desk. Run, Spot, run!

Several things of note in this picture.

1) The Starbucks travel mug, which I brought from home this morning, that was full of coffee, which you can add to my total caffeine tally of the day.
2) The little Tiffany's bag, which I carried some CDs and the camera in today. That I carry something in everyday. Is that not SO obnoxious of me?
3) The sensual mood lighting from IKEA, for I hate the ceiling lights so that I would rather work in a dim dank cave.
4) The Carbon Leaf poster, recently hung in its place of glory.
5) The wall calendar, which was not my choice, but was my Christmas gift from my company. They also supplied me with refills for my dayplanner. They really want to make sure I know what day it is. But they didn't have to worry, because my underwear tells me that.

This is the other side of my office. Please note the abundance of Important Looking Files and Binders and Finance Books, which are exquisitely balanced with the talking Pets.com sock puppet, Muppet finger puppets, tribble and Justin Timberlake bobblehead. Also Mickey and Eeyore, who is Scotch-taped to the bookcase by his neck. Also also, fake flowers from Target give my office a very homey feel.

I know how to work exactly three buttons on that phone, by the way.

I think I've mentioned my hoard (horde? whored?) of free trial subscription financial newspapers, right? Here they are. They are so pretty and unsullied. And unread.

There is an envelope from The Wall Street Journal in my mailbox at work. It looks important. I am afraid to open it because it might be a bill or something. I don't remember signing up for a trial subscription or anything...it just started showing up. So I will do the adult, responsible thing and ignore it completely.

Anyway. I'm starting to crash a little bit. But there is still so much more!

Like this!  This is Van Gogh's ear! For real!  I actually won this somehow. Some trivia contest or something. I can't remember. But the ear is actually one of those sticky stretchy things that if you throw at the wall it will kind of climb all the way down. It is Awesome. Except that the last time I played with it I threw it too hard and it just stuck to the wall and left this big greasy mark on the paint. Still. Awesome.

Now we shall move on to the more shameful aspects of my office. (And since you now know that I have no shame in owning a Justin Timberlake bobblehead doll, y'all better prepare yourselves.)

Ahem. First up. Under the desk.

A dark and vile place. Where small shopping bags go to languish and die. Where red pens weep, uncapped and dried out. Where bottles of water sit until swamp life appears. Where I keep a mini-fridge stashed with Coke and chocolate. Where all the Post-Its that I write important things on apparently end up.

Also, look at those boring shoes! Boring boring boring! I hate work shoes! I look like a nun! Wah.

Next up. The DRAWERS. Dun dun duuuuun...

Right. So the first one is the bottom drawer. In which there is a spare hairbrush and lint roller, plus my in-case-of-lunch-emergency backup jar of peanut butter. And honey. And oatmeal. That oatmeal is probably about three years old, as I bought it in a fit of good-breakfast-intentions a very long time ago. I have eaten about two packets. I also keep my lone office Christmas decoration in here, which I just removed from my computer monitor last Wednesday.

And now the top drawer. Which is just full of crap, crap and more crap. Old paystubs, napkins I have stolen from various restaurants, salt and pepper packets, a slot machine pencil sharpener, some dried ancho chiles and pages from my cat-a-day photo calendar that I thought were especially cute. There are about 202 pages in there so far this year. Also my calculator that I use for complicated stock market math, but which only works now if I hold it right up to my lamp.

Anyway. That's about it. Except for this. This was me this morning, before I'd had any coffee at all.

And this is me now.

FACT: Caffeine not only makes you hyper, it gives your skin a near-radioactive GLOW.

The Weekend of the Leaf

BUT FIRST, THE SLEEP REPORT:

Friday night: 12 glorious (albeit strongly medicated) hours of sleep.

Saturday night:  Yeah, not so much. But how much sleep can you really expect after finding yourself in line for chili cheese fries at 3:30 am?  (Yeah, just keep reading.) Although I did have this one really vivid dream about being Mariah Carey’s personal assistant. Mariah was exactly the sort of damaged train wreck one secretly hopes she is, except even more so, like Anna Nicole Smith. Like I picked out a dress for her to wear and she put it on backwards and I had to do her hair for her because she kept putting pink bows in it. And I was all, Bad Mariah, no! No bows! I also defended her to everybody by saying she was just “fragile.”  She also had a huge ass.

Sunday night: Was on my way to a good eight hours of sleep when Jason woke up at 4 am due to some kind of allergic reaction to our sheets. Or to the detergent we washed the sheets in, which was not my beloved Allergen-Free All but some vile Bounty-of-Allergen Tide. As a result, have been up since. And if you ask me if I did anything productive like get to work on time, I will totally lie and say yes.

AND NOW…

So. Saturday morning.  Or really, Saturday noonish. I was still sitting on the couch in an unshowered puddle when Jason spotted an ad in the paper for Carbon Leaf’s latest album. The latest album I have listened to a bazillion times already and am totally peer-pressuring all my friends into buying.

Oh, but wait! The ad was also for an in-store concert by Carbon Leaf at a Borders’ in Maryland.  That started in…holy shit…two hours so FOR THE LOVE OF GOD GET SHOWERED WE HAVE TO GO NOW.

So we went. But oh! My! God! As we walked in the mall entrance, I noticed this guy in front of us was carrying an instrument case stenciled with CARBON LEAF.

Lead singer, babies. His name is Barry Privett and just prepare yourselves, because one day you are all going to want to sleep with him, for he is HOT. (And to Fresh Baked who pointed out an unfortunate resemblance to that bug-eyed freak that played Fourney in that Natalie Portman movie where she gives birth in a Wal-Mart or whatever: No more Fourney. The hair is cut and so are the biceps. Yowl.)

Jason and I were all, “Holy shit! It’s Barry!” But then we did all that second-guessing and whispering and whatnot until we stepped on an escalator right behind him. (I was eye-level with his ass, people. Who wants to touch me?) I finally made Jason say something to him, which he did, and Barry was all nice and shook our hands and talked to us the whole way up to Borders’. I was only sort of a blithering stalkerish idiot.

Oh, and we forgot the camera. Please to enjoy some grainy camera-phone pictures that are all we have to remember the coolest concert I have ever attended in a retail environment.

We bought a second copy of the CD, because we fight over the one we already have. Plus we wanted more autographs. AND they let me steal a poster off a bookcase and they autographed it. WITH MY NAME. And I gave Barry a wee hug, which was better than the last time I hugged him, which was after their last concert at the 9:30 Club in D.C. and I was very drunk and sweaty and I distinctly remember squealing.

Anyway. Ta-da!

THIS WEEK’S EXPENSIVE MATERIAL POSSESSION CURRENTLY FILLING THE BABY-SHAPED HOLE IN OUR LIVES:

We bought a new camera. A Canon PowerShot SD110 Digital ELPH.

The concert was the last straw.  Now, we have a digital camera. A very nice one, actually. It’s just HUGE. And complicated. It intimidates the crap out of me and I always end up taking it to Jason and asking him to set it up for me so my pictures won’t look like crap.

So we bought a new one that’s small and all point-and-shootable. It’s actually so wee I can keep it in my purse or even a wristlet. And you hit a button and it takes the picture. I think it does more than that, but those were the major selling points for me.

(We’ve taken a frillion pictures with it already. I’ve put them in a separate album so this entry won’t take three years to load. Warning: These are not good pictures. Many of them? Are downright horrible. But they are NEW. NEW NEW NEW. There are also lots of self-indulgent arms-length shots and also a lot of the cat. Who is ADORABLE and I KNOW you want to look at him in various stages of sitting and staring.)

I wish I could buy a camera that would make me look less stupid.

AND THE MAIN EVENT…

We went to see Carbon Leaf AGAIN on Saturday night at the 9:30 Club, which is a very cool and small venue. But it’s also very cutthroat. It’s all general standing-room admission and people are total assholes. I hate people.

We staked out a spot nice and close to the stage but spent half the show defending our territory against stage-crashing drunks. I seriously had WORDS with these two Drunk Girls before Carbon Leaf came onstage who thought that they deserved to be in front of us because it was the one girl’s birthday. Or “biirfffday”, as she put it. They also thought making out would change people’s minds. I tried to reason with them that there was no way in hell I was letting them push me aside and then realized I was arguing with a completely smashed 21-year-old who looked like the chubby Dixie Chick. Anyway, there was no point in getting worked up over it because they left to go throw up a few minutes later.

Other thoughts from the concert:

You have not truly lived until you’ve heard a celtic-folk-rock band do a Zeppelin cover on acoustic guitar. You simply have not lived.

Wearing flip-flops to a standing-room only show is Stupid. Stupid dumb idiot moron.

Barry wore the same t-shirt he wore at the Borders’ show. I would say “ew” but he looked really good in it. He should probably never change.

Our camera didn’t really do us much good at the show, as we got yelled at when we used the flash. Without the flash, we took a lot of nice pictures of darkness. Which is why I posted all those crappy pictures, because I must justify the existence of the new camera in one way or another.  Anyway, I don't need photos from the concert, for they are printed on my heart. I will also check out the fan sites for other people's and then steal them.

AND, THE AFTERMATH…

After the show we wandered around, decided we were hungry, and ended up at Ben’s Chili Bowl, the D.C. institution of late-night-drunk food in a slightly sketchy area that you don’t notice because you’re drunk. This is where we found ourselves, at 3:30 am, waiting in LINE for chili cheese fries. Which were the most delicious thing I have ever tasted. I very nearly wept over them…it was that good.

On the way out? As I pushed my way through the line? This woman sitting in a booth shrieked. “DON’T TOUCH ME!” and pulled away in horror, like I had open sores and was lurching towards her clamoring for brains. I stopped and stared at her, because she didn’t look like The Crazy. She actually looked pretty normal. She shrieked again, “WHATEVER YOU DO, DON’T TOUCH ME.”

And with a bravery unseen by most white girls, this white girl in particular, I looked her right in the eye and told her to calm the fuck down, because I wasn’t going to fucking touch you, you crazy bitch.

And then I went home and had the crazy Mariah dream. La la la.

ONE LAST PARTING SHOT:

You know you had a good night when there's an empty wine bottle in the trash IN YOUR BATHROOM.

That is all, thank you, good night. Will be here all week.