OR, A BREAK IN THE DRAMA, SORT OF

Yes. I am here to give advice and to solve problems and finally tell you exactly how to get your damn life in order. Like mine! Because I am perfect and smart and totally together.

(It's a new tradition at Amalah.com: Wednesday is now Opposite Day, where everything Amy says is completely the opposite of the truth. Sort of like lying, only let's not add THAT to her already impressive resume of compulsive behavior, okay?)

Wednesday is also Busy Work Day, for I have done NOTHING for a week except file things. File file file. And stare into space and and then yank stuff out of file folders to re-file because I forgot that I already filed it. I also made neat little stacks of papers on the floor, which is my pre-filing system for stuff that still needs to be filed.  And I made pretty filing labels for file folders that I have yet to attach to any file folders.

Needless to say, there was other stuff I should have been doing this week besides filing.

So while I'm working on that, I shall spread out today's advice column in a sporadic and unfiled manner, with questions appearing at random times throughout the afternoon until I run out of questions, get bored and/or have a meltdown of some sort.

You just never know with me! Am wild and impulsive! Party! Woo! Etc.

Dear Amalah,

My computer punked out on me last week, after a short and sudden illness.  Yes, I am bitter, because I had just given her a Windows upgrade, iTunes, and the protection of SpySweeper.  Instead, she apparently had some sort of rendezvous with all those unsavory websites and cute and charming but dangerous executable files that I had always warned her about.  And who's paying the price?  Me, in the form of the new computer that I now have to buy.

But then I got to wondering.....could this have been bad karma because of all the music and video files I had on my hard drive that I got from, uh, less than 100% legal means?  OR, EVEN WORSE, has the RIAA given up on lawsuits, and is now fighting back with malicious spyware?  Or am I just paranoid?  Really, I was reformed!  I had uninstalled Kaaza and installed iTunes!  I had an iTunes account! I purchased a Moby album and that song by the Killers!  I was cleaning up my nasty file-sharing habit and heading on the straight and narrow! I was paying for music from the Internet! Where did I go wrong?

Signed,
Best Buy Better Give Me A Damn Refund For the Windows Upgrade I Bought Three Weeks Ago

Dude, give it UP. We’ve all heard about you and the porn. The whole Internet knows about you and the porn.

(Speaking of the porn, if someone could find me "San Fernando Jones and the Temple of Poon" on one of those file sharing sites? I would be so eternally grateful, because that is the Best Title Ever. Just don't send it to me. Send it to these crazy wackaloons. Thanks.)

But seriously, your old computer is gone. Say goodbye to her viral, porn-riddled ass. Embrace the joy of the new computer. Think about it. You'll have a pristine hard drive. A pure Internet cache. A pious temp folder. A prudent FreeCell record. And other P words too, which I would look up in my pampered Word thesaurus, except that I’m feeling a tad persnickety and pragmatic today.

(Poon is also a P word. Poon is an awesome P word. Especially when you say "of poon" for random things. It’s a Wednesday…of poon! I have a meeting…of poon!  I can’t wait to take a nap…of poon!)

So once you get your new computer, stay away from the porn, unless you are downloading it IRONICALLY, because it has an awesome title. Also maybe email me instructions for how to use Kazaa, because it confuses me.  I miss Napster, which was like the AOL of illegal file-sharing and did not judge me for wanting Chumbawamba's Tubthumping but gave me lots of pretty high-speed places to get it from and did not trick me into downloading the entire motion picture soundtrack of Newsies seven times by mistake.

(By the way, that whole "of poon" thing was so much funnier when Dawnie and I first started doing that over IM. Seriously. It was a laff riot.)

(Of poon!)

Dear Amalah,

So I'm sitting here at work this morning and I come across this article.  Is it not awesome that Blair Warner is quoted in this?  How does she not have her own talk show?  And what would Mrs. Garrett think of all this?

Still stuck in these damn rollerskates,
Tootie

It is a crime against humanity that Blair does not have a talk show. A crime.

And I called Mrs. Garrett to get her opinion on the whole "hot saucing" brouhaha which has exploded all over the place lately, and which we here at Amalah.com knew about WEEKS ago. MONTHS ago even. Because we are so totally hip to whatever crazy antics that Lisa Whelchel is up to these days. And also because we have readers who were given that Creative Correction book by crazy-ass relatives.

(For Amalah.com readers who have no freaking idea what we're talking about, allow us to refer you to an earlier Advice Smackdown.)

(For Amalah.com readers who would like us to stop with the creepy referring to ourselves as plural, allow us to remind you that we are batshit crazy.)

Anyway, hot saucing. Burning the shit out of your child's tongue with Tabasco to teach them not to lie or gossip or whatever. The sins of the tongue or something. Everybody's talking about it and apparently a lot of parents are doing it.

I'm not a parent, so I don't think I can address the rightness or wrongness of hot saucing.

But I do have a valid concern about this tactic. Kids who are punished with hot sauce are never going to like spicy foods and will refuse to even try them. And this means your kids are going to grow up into adults who annoy the living shit out of me. And nobody wants that. So don't do it. Order Indian or Thai food instead and have a nice family dinner and talk to your kids about how lying is wrong except on Wednesdays because then it's not really lying, it's just Opposite Day.

Oh, and Mrs. Garrett thinks hot saucing totally sounds like a sex act.

Ama-lama-lama-lah,

I know that Zoot has recently told you about her Lisa Whelchel fascination. Now I've stumbled upon a page of hers, here, at her agency: http://www.ambassadoragency.com/client_profile.cfm/cid/88, but something about it disturbs me. At the start of the 3rd paragraph it reads: "Whelchel has joined 700,000 others as home-schooling parents, and she teaches her tree children at home."

Tree children? Amy, I'm scared. Should I be scared?

Shiz

Okay, nobody said ANYTHING about hot saucing TREES. That cannot be good for them. Where the fuck is Greenpeace?

Yes, you should be scared. You should be scared of everything on that damn page. Did you know they made a Where the Red Fern Grows, Part Two? What? How? The dogs died at the end of the first one! Right? There's no Part Two! Dogs! Dead! Leave it alone!

I'm also disturbed at the number of Facts of Life reunion specials that have been made. The Facts of Life Go To Paris? The Facts of Life Down Under? They must not make anymore of these. Please write your congressman.

And everybody seems to forget that "the facts of life" are usually referring to procreation and puberty and S-E-X, so the sitcom's title is a clever play on that, but it's not clever when it "goes to Paris." That's like, the WORST euphemism for menstruation EVER.

QoE,

I was involved in a hit-and-run accident on Monday where I was the one being hit.  And, while I would really like to find this person and say mean things, someone else has come along who I may hate more (but still not as much as Jena Malone).

Because of this accident, I was sent in for x-rays to ensure that my spine wasn't fractured.  Super fun, right?  But when I was lying on the table in pain, the home-fry radiologist and all his 'Hey, Big Dawg' glory decided that drumming on said table and thereby sending a little vibration army of pain to the injured area, was #1 in his book of Good Ideas.  I hate him.

So I seek advice from you, Amalah, in trying to figure a way to exact my revenge on either one of these jackholes.  Please keep in mind that while I'm on muscle relaxants, I should not be operating any heavy machinery, nor should I be around anything hot or sharp.

Whoooo, muscle relaxants!

-b

HOT SAUCE THEM! HOT SAUCE THEM!

Whoops. Sorry about that, B. That was Mrs. Garrett. She's all drunk or hopped up on X or something and keeps taking over my column.

But I do agree with her, to a point. You need some creative revenge tactics. And since today's column has turned into "All Lisa Whelchel, All the Damn Time" (and since I'm also not creative because anti-psychotic meds have turned my brain into Synapse Soup), I think we should consider taking some advice from her book.

Like this one: If your child refuses to hold your hand while crossing the street, hold them by his or her hair. Find the hit and run guy and drag him back to the scene of the crime by his hair. Or have someone else do it so you don't hurt yourself. You can watch and take pictures. Post them on the Internet.

Or this one: If your toddler throws a tantrum, try using a spray bottle to spray water in his or her face. Go back to the hospital and spray the X-ray guy in the face. If you really want to drive the point home, try using bleach or acid instead.

OR HOT SAUCE!

(Shut UP, you old bag!)

Amalah:

Reading about scary Blair and her scary life has disrupted my entire office. People are trying hot saucing and accepting Jesus left and right (and then giggling at the thought of spending eternity with the scary lady). And then we moved on to Kirk Cameron's site, and there is more giggling and talk of eternity. Help! How do I get back on track? And, really, should the boss be sending around links to scary funny websites? And, also, how the hell did I get to be the boss?

mc

Then you probably won't appreciate me giving you this link, which someone emailed to me awhile ago, and I have been waiting for the perfect time to spring it on all of y'all, and that perfect time is NOW, and I apologize because I CANNOT REMEMBER who sent it to me because I am SENILE and GMail is not working with the search capabilities today and I am SORRY.

www.bibleman.com

Bibleman? Is Willy Aames. Tommy from Eight is Enough. Yes. He started the ministry after kicking a cocaine habit. Oh God, yes.

Dear Amalah,

My journal has the bestest readers in the whole wide world. I've been having a really (REALLY) tough time lately and finally broke down and wrote a little about It and my readers just swooped in with the love and the email and the comments and the hugs and the good squishy thoughts. They even got all outraged and riled on my behalf when other people were mean. And nobody got scared off when I was all "Hi, I've been diagnosed with recurrent non-seasonal major depression plus a panic disorder with OCD tendencies that manifest in anorexia and self-injury. How are YOU?" Instead, they just swooped in with more love.

So here's the thing: I'm kind of uppity and snarky on my site. I'm not all fuzzy and warm unless I'm posting kissy pictures of my puppy like this one. But I really want to tell my readers how much I love them and how I want to have a big old sleepover and make everyone chocolate chip cookies and paint their toenails and braid their pretty hair. Is there any way to do that without sounding like that Wil Wheaton tool? Would my readers lose respect for me if I went all squeeish on them?

Love,
Amalah

PS. You are pretty! I would like to buy you a new purse!

Shut it, Crazy Girl. Go take your meds and maybe stop talking about yourself for one freaking second. Also, your hair looks like shit in that picture.