Bros & Cons

Today's blog post is a classic case of good news/bad news.

First, some good news: it's everyone's favorite fictional weekly holiday—T.G.I. Hagman!


As of 4:30 on July 30, 2010, Larry Hagman is...alive! And installing a solar panel somewhere, I'm sure. (Lord love him.)

The bad news is that we got a Cease and Desist Order yesterday. From Dr. Reuben, of author of Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex But Were Too Afraid to Ask, fame. Yeah. I know. It's like Christmas has come early. And speaking of Christmas, all I want this year is to make it six months without someone threatening to sue us. Because come on. I don't have anything worth suing over. I think I have a few bags of half-melted Hanukkah gelt and an impressive collection of Ken Paves clip-on hair...? But that's pretty much it. That is the extent of my fortune. And frankly, sir, you are more than welcome to it.

Here's what the Cease and Desist Order said:

CEASE AND DESIST ORDER

Dear madam,

You are using extensive material from a work the copyright of which is owned by Dr. David Reuben, M.D.

The name of the work involved is "Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex." It appears on a site operated by you at: http://www.2birds1blog.com.

Dr. Reuben has reserved all rights to this work, which was first published in 1969 in the United States of America.

Your copying and or use of his work, which appear at the link above, is unauthorized. You neither ask for nor recieved permission the peice nor to make nor distribute copies of them in the manner you have.

Therefore, I believe you have willfully infringed Dr. Reuben's rights under 17 USC 101, et seq. and could be liable for statutory damages as high as $100,000.000 or more, in the United States and any other country where this site is viewed. Further, I believe such copyright infringement is a direct violation of The Digital Millennium Copyright Act and International Copyright Law.

I demand that you immediately cease use and distribution from any material of the work and all copies of it, that you remove any further of Dr. Reuben's works you may have used and that you desist from this or any other infringement of Dr. Reuben's rights in the future.

Furthermore, I demand that you immediately post an apology on the site informing others that who might have been misled by your work.

This Cease and Desist Order applies to all versions of this site which may be available in any form in any language and in any jurisdiction or country whatsoever.

If I have not received proof of your compliance from you within five working days, I shall consider taking the full legal remedies available to rectify this situation.

Your truly,

D. Robert Hatouian

Not to be an asshole, but the most shocking thing about this entire situation isn't that Dr. Reuben sent us a Cease and Desist Order, it's that Dr. Reuben is alive. And alive enough to be offended. Crazy.

I'm tempted to tell the good doctor that he'll get his apology when my cold, dead body coke-douches it out, considering how 99.9% of the Twitter responses I got regarding this situation were along these lines:

TheBrittaTruth

@2birds1blog STFU, really? He should thank you. I bought 2 of his books solely because of you.

But, between me, you and my lipstick case-filled urethra, I have $40 in my checking account, -$9.95 in savings and my lawyer's email address keeps bouncing back. Sooo, on behalf of my tooth-filled vagina, faggy co-writer and colored friends, I hereby decry that 2birds1blog will no longer feature Dr. Reuben's Q&A of the Day, and I, Meghan C. McBlogger, am sorry. Just in general. As a person. All-around. But specifically, we, as a blog and a Nation, are sorry for:

1.) Not understanding Dr. Rebuen's astute analysis of the homosexual mind.

2.) Mocking Dr. Reuben's whimsical attitude towards barrier methods.

3.) Diluting ourselves into believing that prostitutes can have feelings and orgasms.

4.) The disbelief we felt upon discovering that the clitoris falls off after over-use.

5.) The itching, the burning, the peeling, and the foamy discharge.

But mostly, we're sorry we didn't think of writing a book based on penthouse letters and klan literature first. Hats off to you, sir. Hats off to you.

- Sigh. It kind of feels like the end of an era, doesn't it? But not to worry! There's still good news to be had! Because today marks the return of RECRAP FRIDAYS! That's right, tonight was the season premier of the second season of "Jersey Shore" and you bet your Depp hair gel I was all over it. In fact, my "spotters" from last season—Laura and Andrew of the Great Juno Debate—came over to keep me company again, but not before we had a big Italian pot-luck dinner and popped a bottle of champagne at 10 o'clock to ring in the Guido New Year. They even got party favors to take home!

Yep. Those are Ed Hardy lighters I found at a Walgreens in Foggy Bottom. Because nothing's more badass than letting the entire world know you're a douchebag—via FIRE! (And speaking of Walgreens, this is from an article in this week's issue of US Weekly about celebrity mugshots:

How in love am I with Shia Labeouf? Because there, sandwiched between Nicole Richie's 2006 DUI and Matt Dillon's obscene 2008 reckless driving charge, is old Shia with a 2007 booking after he quote, "wouldn't leave a Walgreens." I hope one day I make it into the Celebrity Mugshot Hall of Fame when I refuse to lower my voice because the girl behind the deli counter didn't give me the full quarter-pound of virginia shaved ham I paid for. Because in this kind of economy, I will not be Jewed out of my deli meats, a-thank you very much...

The season 2 premiere of "Jersey Shore" was kind of...lackluster. But I totally get why. It was an establishing episode. It reminded us what happened last season and established this season's plot, so we can all move forward on the same page next week. It was this season's prologue, if you will. The entire episode can pretty much be nutshelled as:

WE KILLED IT IN JERSEY, BRO! -> It's cold as fuck in December on the East Coast -> Weather patters, weather patterns, weather patters, -> LET'S GO TO MIAMI! -> Questionably racist statements about Barack Obama -> Angelina's here?!!?!?!1 -> Ronnie and Sammi: Awkward. -> THE END.

But, for the sake of a good recap, I'll delve a little deeper.

SO! As previously mentioned, they totally killed it in Jersey, bro, so the "Jersey Shore" cast decides they should do it again, but this time in Miami. I get that. Helena, Alex, College Roommate Danielle and I went to Miami for Spring Break senior year, so we certainly know first hand how hard that city can party, AM I RIGHT OR AM I RIGHT, YOU GUYS?! (Lies. We spent the entire vacation either at the beach or in our hotel room watching three back-to-back seasons of "Golden Girls" on DVD while playing a drinking game loosely based on Uno called, "What's Jiggling?" And I can concretely say without a hint of sarcasm or irony: Best. Spring. Break. Ever.)

A lot has changed since we last left America's favorite guidos: Ronnie and Sammi broke up; Angelina and Pauly D had a one-night stand; everyone suddenly uses each other's Christian names instead of their "Jersey Shore nicknames"; and Snooki is finally dating her "perfect gorilla juicehead." Unfortunately for her, not only am I your humble recapper, but 0Ooo00o0o0o0O0O...I'm also the ghost of Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi's future! And in the future, Snooki's boyfriend will admit that he only dated her for run-off fame, dump her and team up with Spencer Pratt to produce a reality show of his own about Christ knows what. Sorry, dude. It happens to the best of us. My ex-boyfriend is currently penning a book called, "I Dated Meg McBlogger and all I Got Was This Lousy Coupon For Jalapeño Poppers: A Spencer Pratt Production." And I wish them both the best of luck.

But not everything has changed: Pauly D and The Situation are still BFF4Lyfe; as are Snooki and J-Woww. Both decide to road trip from Jersey to Miami, boy vs. girls style, and see which pair gets there first. So they lock their £20,000 wagers in a sturdy carpet bag, hop into their respective hot air balloons and by George, it's away they go!

COMMERCIAL BREAK! And man; you know you've made it when your usual Jovan Man Body Heat cologne commercials are replaced by the extended trailer for an upcoming Mark Whalberg/Will Ferrell movie...Welcome to the American Dream.

SURPRISE! Angelina is back this season! For those of you who don't remember Angelina (or Jolie, as absolutely no one calls her,) she was the gal from Season 1 who hauled her clothes around in trash bags and left after, oh, two episodes because she missed her boyfriend and didn't feel like working. So essentially she's That Girl who works two cubicles down from you in your office. Well, apparently Angelina's been talking to Pauly D and The Situation a lot and both mentioned they're going to Miami, so naturally that means they invited her in Angelina's Land of Extreme Ass-Backwardsery. A mystical land where booty shorts are worn with high-heeled sandals; garbage receptacles are luggage; and publicly saying things like, "I'm the Kim Kardashian of Staten Island" isn't mortifying. How does one get there? Second star on the right and straight on til a morning full of deep, deep regrets...

Despite thinking she was invited, everyone (including Pauly D and The Situation) (who, by the way, beat Snooki and J-Woww to Miami, after getting stuck in the mud for an hour and having a circle jerk around Pauly D's AAA Gold Card,) are pretty shocked to see her. The girls choose to deal with this by flat-out ignoring her while Pauly D and The Situation let her bunk with them because who knows—"maybe it'll be a slow night, raining out, got no chicks and who knows what will happen." Ah, yes: Roses are red, violets are blue/ We couldn't find any proper trim, so we settled on you. That's gotta make a girl feel special.

Angelina is in a real fried pickle here, you guys: she's in a house where everyone pretty much openly hates her and she's stuck there for the next three months or so, under contract. Angelina assures The Situation that she'll "do whatever it takes to be cool with these people." Which is funny, because that's exactly what I said the first day of middle school, and we all know two weeks into that I was wearing stirrup pants and spending my Saturday nights brushing my Beanie Baby collection with a mini Barbie comb. Likewise, things don't work out so well for old Angelina. Because apparently her version of "doing whatever it takes to be cool with these people" involves a lot of confrontation and swears. After nearly getting her ass kicked by J-Woww and the 2002 prom dress she rode in on, Angelina decides that she doesn't want to associate with the girls at all. So, you know, good thing she's on a reality show with them.

Now, this is normally where I'd make fun of the Everyone Loves Raymond style plot-line surrounding Ronnie and Sammie's relationship, but their Season 2 drama is actually pretty damn good so far. You see, despite breaking up, Sam is still in love with Ron, but doesn't know where Ron stands. Where does Ron stand? Oh, the same spot where Ben Affleck's character in 1994's "Lifestories: Families in Crisis" A Body to Die For: The Aaron Henry Story stood when he was all juiced up, yelling at his girlfriend, right before he killed her kitten. See, Ron is harboring just a liiiiiittle bit of resentment from the break-up. Just a wee bit. And one night he has a smidge of a break-down, calls Sam a cunt, goes into full-blown Creepy Mode and hooks up with everything in Miami, from the grenades (fat, ugly chicks) to the land-mines (skiny, ugly chicks) to the palm trees (any plant of the Palmae family) while Sam tosses and turns at home, wondering how she's ever going to live with her ex.

FIN!

(God that feels good to do again.) Have a great weekend and we'll see you right back here Monday morning! L8r!

A Moving Apology

Sorr about No Post Tuesday the other day. There was an incident, and then a second incident compounding the first incident, and then a string of lesser incidents that complicated the prior two incidents. In short, I’m moving.

I joke about suicide a lot and occasionally make threats so I can sneak 11 items through the express line, but moving is genuinely one of the few things I’d rather die than do. (Okay, I guess not technically or my head would already be in the oven, but you know what I mean.) I am not neat, patient, organized, or efficient, and generally have none of the Boy Scout virtues that the task requires.

We simply couldn’t avoid moving. The place we’re leaving is technically too much apartment, but I’d be willing to swallow the cost had we not had repeated landlord/other tenant problems, including but not limited to: the electric company threatening to break open the sidewalk because the downstairs tenants wouldn’t let them in to fix the meter; water seeping into the downstairs apartment that we got blamed for until the handyman spent three hours flushing our toilets and pouring jugs of water on the floor to see where the leak was and couldn’t find it; “Sweet Home Alabama” karaoke every night of the week downstairs (you think it’s an easy tune to carry, but you’re wrong); and, the topper although we were already leaving, last night the contractors redoing the floor downstairs set off the fire alarm with a power sander, somehow, solved the problem by disconnecting the fire alarm, which is both unsafe and causes a loud beep every four seconds from the hall control box, and then kept sanding until one in the morning.

My last apartment hunt was terribly easy, and even though the landlord and neighbor situation has been awful, it’s a fabulous apartment. This one, however, was a living hell. I called eight or so realtors one day, and most didn’t even answer the phone. Not one returned my phone messages, and of the people who answered I got one “we’ll call you this afternoon” and one “I don’t know if we have any apartments or not, I’ll call you Friday.” They did not. Of the realtors I did manage eventually to reach, one canceled my appointment half an hour before and never returned my calls to reschedule, and another rescheduled my appointment so he could show the apartment, which p.s. was crappy, to eight people at the same time. Now ordinarily I have the work ethic of a ninety-year-old narcoleptic Spaniard, but don’t realtors work on commission? Don’t they kind of have to show apartments or… you know, starve?

Remember my inventory of weird shit in the apartment from my eccentricity post? Tip of the iceberg. I have a really hard time giving away anything someone gave me, which explains the eight pounds of Mardi Gras beads. (This is the only time you’ll hear me imply that a stranger is a person.) I’m also really easy to shop for, so I still have most of the birthday presents I ever got as an adult (rocket ship lamp, plush pig in a flapper costume, and the pirate mug). Giant Camel also used to buy clothes for fun, which is terribly alien to me. I have a long torso and short legs, so anything more tailored than a muumuu fits me weird. Buying a pair of pants for me is usually at least a three-Goddammit job for me, but somehow Giant Camel used to fill his days buying what must be forty pounds of Technicolor polyester man-blouses. I also brought along, inexplicably, my one family heirloom – a large, technically ugly cedar chest upholstered in Naugahyde (yes) that my parents got for their wedding. They got married in 1975, which is reflected in the architecture of the chest. I love it. I also keep every letter anyone ever writes me (any person, not old gas bills and shit. Yet.)

So I bought plastic tubs at Target, and I packed everything I could figure out how to pack and I was really proud of myself. Dishes interspersed with clothes so no one tub was too heavy, all cooking stuff together, spices in one bag, etc. For one glorious moment, I looked competent.

LOL!!!!!1!

The kitchen was my first setback. (Well, first after “being born with ADD” and “being a loner so no one is helping me do this.”) After my big false-alarm heart scare last winter, I bought all this salt-free crap that I now got to throw out, including Salt-Free Tony Chachere’s Cajun Seasoning. The salt substitute they use it a powder, not a crystal like real salt, so when I poured it out (why?) and got a wafting face-full of a secret spicy blend. Snot everywhere. (It’s no diarrhea story, but it is embarrassing and does deal with a human fluid.) I also had a tub of expired plain yogurt I’d bought mistaking it for vanilla. I had the SUPER clever idea to flush this down the toilet so it wouldn’t sit around in the trash bag and spoil and smell. I reasoned that toilets have to deal with worse. There’s probably some scientific specific-gravity reason why toilets will suck human waste away perfectly and send it straight to the Schuylkill while not doing the same with a quart of yogurt, but I don’t know what it is. What I do know is that bits of yogurt kept floating back into the bowl for about two days, and since yogurt is essentially made of bacteria, some weird, flourishing colony of some kind has established itself in the toilet.

So now that all the stuff that packs is packed, I’m left with a stratum of What-the-Hell items. Free lint roller I got for Christmas from the dry cleaners. Where does that go? Should I fill GC’s various overnight bags with actual stuff or with each other? Bowl that’s supposed to be a pear but looks more like a bedpan goes on the curb, but what about the Ugly Plastic Leaf Plate? One loose Ambien I found on the desk can go in my stationery box until thirty minutes before I leave for tonight’s internship board meeting, but canned goods? Can’t I just leave the dented-so-half-off can of sauerkraut for the next tenant? And, God above, TWO BOXES OF AUDIOCASSETTES?

All the movers I called had already been booked until well in advance, so I’m forced to beg my friends for help. My local friends are a lady construction worker and a Marine with a bad shrapnel injury. Add to this my generally modest physical talents and we almost add up to one mover.

And so of course just this minute I got called into work. Maybe while I’m gone the house will burn down and I won’t have to pack.

As promised.

Sigh. As I mentioned earlier, something painfully embarrassing happened to me at work the other day. And with all painfully embarrassing things that happen to me, I need to discuss it here on the blog so I get it out of my system and can move on with my life. So more painfully embarrassing things can happen to me.

Back-story: Every single job that I've ever had has been a total...whatever the female version of a "sausage fest" is. (I can't come up with anything that doesn't make me a.) want to vomit or b.) sound extraordinarily gay, i.e. lady fest.) (Update: I just googled "what is the opposite of a sausage fest?" and the consensus seems to be either a "taco fest" or a "fish market". And now I want to slice wrists.) In high school I worked for a small woman-owned book store; my first job out of college was working for Soap Opera Digest (which was 99.9% homely women and .1% token gay guy with his dead dog's name tattooed on his forearm;) and my most recent job was, of course, working for the menopausal Macgyver of tampons that was Boss #1 and Boss #2. Now I'm back working the retail job I had in college, and in turn, I'm experiencing the same problem I had there during my first tenure—it's a total dude-tease.

I feel like there's this myth about working in retail that hot guys are in and out of your store all day and you help them and make them laugh and there's a spark and they ask you when your shift ends and you're like, "um, not soon enough?" and you both giggle and meet up for drinks at Garrett's afterwards and you fall in love and everything is wonderful and you have this adorable story about how you met and when he gives his speech at the rehearsal dinner he's like, "I went into her store that day because I needed envelopes—who knew I'd leave with a wife?" (Not like I've thought about it before...) I probably got this idea because I feel like customers were always asking out Helena when she worked at the Barnes & Noble across the street. Although to be fair, the discrepancy between our Georgetown retail experiences may have something to do with the fact that Helena's a petite blonde with sparkling blue eyes and I look like I should be an ironic cartoon about a girl who hates life that only comes on The Cartoon Network Network after midnight, but still. Despite our store's all-female staff, I was looking forward to hot guys coming in and having lots of flirting opportunities with them.

And to be fair, they do. Hot guys come into the store all the time. Unfortunately, they come in with their equally hot girlfriends to pick out wedding invitations. And it's such a fucking tease, you guys. Such a tease. Last week this hot guy came in looking for stationary and I took like, 20 minutes to explain all of our paper options and helped him put together a nice combination of flat cards and envelopes and at the end he was like, "This is awesome. My wife is really going to like this." Really asshole? You couldn't have mentioned that this was for your wife a little earlier? And wear a ring, hippie. I just wasted my special reserve top-shelf customer service on you. Had I known you were married, I probably would have just pointed to the back of the store and been like, "Meh. It's all on that wall somewhere." Gawd.

My point being, you can imagine my excitement last week when an extremely attractive guy came in all covered in sweat, fresh from a run, asking if we had biodegradable envelopes he could use to pick up his dog's crap. Now I'm going to stop myself there—yes, he was looking for biodegradable envelopes to pick up his dog's crap. Yes, I just found out that my friends refer to not recycling as "Meg McBloggering". But with facial scruff like that and forearms like those, I'd chain myself to a tree and throw used tampons at BP gas pumps any day of the week if he asked.

Besides being painfully handsome, this gentleman had a few other things going for him: he was sans significant other, he wasn't wearing a wedding ring, he was in our store for a reason other than celebrating the love he'd found, and he was only a tiny blip on my gaydar. And in a city like Washington, D.C., I will take those odds and I will run with them.

Truthfully we had nothing that could really work for what he needed, but I wanted a chance to lay on the old Meg McBlogger charm, so I showed him our glassine and eco-white envelopes to buy myself some facetime. Unfortunately what I didn't factor into this situation was that "Meg McBlogger charm" is an oxy-moron and I was so excited that a hot, potentially single guy had wandered my way, I lost any social skills that I at any point ever had. (And mind you, I wasn't starting with much.)

But how could you blame me?! I've been waiting four months for this mythical creature to wander into the store and there he was! AND HE HAD A DOG! AND EMOTIONS ABOUT THE ENVIRONMENT! Slightly obnoxious emotions, yes, but EMOTIONS nonetheless! If Nessie wandered over to a group of Loch Ness Monster Hunters and was like, "Hi! Here I am! Want some pictures, because I came with headshots!", you wouldn't expect them to be like, "Oh. Sure. Yeah. Good to see you. Leave them on the top of that pile over there, will you? Kay, take it easy." and go on with their day like nothing happened, would you? WOULD YOU?! No. So I'm sure you can understand what happened next.

As we discussed his dog, what we sell and what exactly it was that he was looking for, I don't want to say that I was shaking, but let's just say that I had been more still before. That and when I get nervous, I tend to talk a lot and really fast. So basically what I'm trying to say is he probably thought I had just made love to a giant vile of crack cocaine. We decided that the closest thing we had to what he was looking for was our glassine envelopes, but they didn't fit the bill perfectly. I then suggested that if he were in the mood for a lovely drive, he should check out "Bark", an eco-friendly pet store in Olney, Maryland, which I only know about because that's where I'm from. (And by the way, I'm still 100% shocked that I didn't suggest we swing by on our way to have brunch with my parents because I think it's high time they finally met. Shocked and a little proud.)

He was really fixated on our glassine envelopes, however, and kept stressing that they'd be perfect if they were a little wider so he could stick his hand in to pick up his dog's crap. We actually do have wider glassine envelopes, but unfortunately the flap on those are on the long side and not on top, so it wouldn't really be that conducive to shoving your hand in.

Now, what I meant to say to him at this point was, "Yeah. These [meaning the wider envelopes with the opening along the long side] won't work because you need the hand jab thingy at the top. [Makes jabbing motion in the air like you're sliding your hand into a bag that eggrolls come in when you get chinese]"

However, what I actually said was: "Yeah. These won't work. You need a hand job. [Repetitively jabs hand in the air, back and forth.]

YOU NEED. A. HAND. JOB.

WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH ME?!?!!?!?! It's like I could see the words that I was trying to say on a chalkboard, and then I could see the key words falling off and what's left moving together to suddenly make the most molestery sentence on the face of the planet.

I was looking down at the stack of envelopes when I said this, and when I realized what had just happened, I swear to god, my head shot up and I just stared ahead for a few seconds like a deer caught in headlights. Then, my eyes darted over and met his and we had the following conversation without ever having to say a word:

Him: Did...you just say—

Me: YES. YES I DID. I'M SO SORRY.

Him: Like a hand jo—

Me: PLEASE STOP. DON'T SAY IT OUT LOUD. PLEASE JUST DON'T SAY IT.

Him: Do you really think I need a—

Me: NO. I THINK YOU'RE PROBABLY DOING JUST FINE. I'M SO SORRY.

Him: So you have thought about me getting a—

Me: I WILL PAY YOU CASH MONEY TO PLEASE JUST MOVE ON AND GO BACK TO TALKING ABOUT YOUR ECO DOG.

"Yeah...I think I'm going to try a Chinese restaurant. Thanks for your help though."

And just like that, he walked out of my life and I spent the remaining two hours of my shift having random outbursts of, "HAND JOB. I said he needed a HAND JOB," while my co-workers shamelessly laughed at me.

And to think, I gave someone advice this week on how to not be socially awkward. Sigh...I clearly owe that person one helluva hand job.