My Lee Norris Complex

So it’s officially been 7 months since I’ve graduated from my alma mater (the prestigious NYU Tisch School of the Arts, BFA in Drama, 3.8 GPA, with honors - of course) and as we roll into 2012 with gusto, I can’t help but take a look back and recount the year that was. Sure, 2011 dealt me a handful of ups, a smattering of downs, and a plethora of situations I really couldn’t give a shit about – but there was certainly one constant that stuck with me throughout the year, and continues to haunt me furthermore:

I am still not a celebrity.

Yes, it’s true. As I approach my 23^rd year on this planet, I still have not achieved the global domination I so desperately need. And I have absolutely no clue how this happened! Surely I have the acting prowess of a young Lawrence Olivier… John Barrymore… Keanu Reaves. Clearly I’m good looking enough to be a muse for any fashion photograher (let alone a certain Gil Ben-Simone. Where the fuck is my Covergirl cosmetics campaign and my contract with Elite Model Management? WHERE?!) So, as I sit here tonight, in my underwear, picking peanut butter puffins ever so delicately out of my golden forest of chest hair, I’ve come up with six reasons explaining how someone as majestic as I could still be among the plebeians. I give you:

6 reasons why I’m still not a celebrity:

How the 90s stole my childhood

If you're a glass half-empty kind of gal (and what girl who spent her adolescence resembling a frizzy q-tip with mosquito bites wouldn't be?) the bumpy road to adulthood was most likely wrought with disappointment. I'm not talking the extremely serious disappointment of finding out you'll have to wear braces to your senior prom...I mean little let downs that didn't seem to matter until you looked back at them in retrospect and thought "hum. That was a disappointing day." Having grown up in the 90s, disappointments ranged from Hey Dude! getting cancelled to realizing middle school boys weren't interested in the tall, nerdy"Jessie Spano" type.

Seeing as listing personal adolescent disappointments might hurt the feelings of former friends, heavily- closeted flames and acquaintances who just might read this blog, I've decided pop culture let downs, and the insecurities left in their wake would be a good way to close out the year. And so, without further ado, the five biggest (that I can think of right now) public let downs of my 27 years...

A Pauper's Christmas

Well. It’s the holidays. My poorest Christmas yet. Gone are the days when I can justify spending $60 on a decorative coffee table book because MAX JUST LOVES VANITY FAIR. No. This is a DIY, mod podge and craft glitter kind of Christmas. My Pinterest is on overload, I’ve gone through about 14 of those useless foam paintbrushes, and I’ve become more of a regular at Michael’s Craft Store than my local Thai restaurant.

I’ve also discovered that glitter is the herpes of crafting. It’s all over me. I shower, I change my clothes…months later, I’m still finding glitter in areas only drag queens find glitter. Drag queens and girls that shop at Rainbow/Tellos/any other store that sells cartoon-emblazoned ankle socks right next to the sluttiest dress you've ever seen.

Despite my sparkly venereal disease, I have discovered that with a little resourcefulness and glass etching cream, I can make some part sweet, part haphazard Christmas cheer worthy of its own Hillary Duff movie—once she’s done randomly being an adult and blowing her man in front of a window. WE CAN SEE YOU, LIZZIE. What would Gordo say?! (probably nothing because according to reliable sources, he's a low-level caterer and isn't really in a position to be throwing shade.)

While Max is dreaming of fighting over the last amuse bouche with Beyonce, my fantasies are of the Mickey Mouse as Bob Cratchit variety. Remember when he had to cut a SINGLE BEAN into fifths for his family to eat? On Christmas Eve, no less? Christmas is on a budget and it’s a jewy, jewy budget. A-list celebs and moose are simply out of the question, unfortunately. 

And so, here is who I'll be eating Ramen Noodles and Apple Jacks with this coming holiday:

My Fantasy Holiday Dinner

It’s that special time of the year again; the time for celebration, family, and good spirits. Christians are decorating their Christmas trees. Jews are polishing their menorahs. Black people are also decorating their Christmas trees (who celebrates Kwanzaa? Who? I want all that time spent learning about it in elementary school back.) Anyway, the holiday season is upon us and that means one thing: big holiday dinners. Accordingly, I've taken the time to create my ultimate fantasy dinner guest list and it goes a little something like this:

"What I Wore" or "I got 99(%) Problems..."

Anyone who reads the New York Times (or more specifically, anyone who reads the New York Times and is also female or homosexual) is probably familiar with the ongoing Fashion column: “What I Wore.” Now, for those of you who don’t know what this is, I’ll fill you in.

Basically the Times profiles obnoxious “society” people and has them document exactly what they wore for an entire week, presumably to give you some incentive to blow out your brains in the middle of a Commes de Garcon showroom.

Below I’ve decided to sample a portion of this past week’s “What I Wore” so you can also experience the overwhelming urge to tear your eyes out. This week’s column chronicles some biddy named, wait for it... Muffie (I know, I can’t make this stuff up):

Ain't I a Jew?

So I’m a terrible Jew and I’ve come to terms with that. Yes, I was bar mitzvahed, yes I went to Hebrew School and yes I was most definitely circumcised (on my dining room table in fact, a detail my mother loves to pepper into polite dinner conversation.) But apart from that, I’m a completely secular Jew. I choose to celebrate my heritage by indulging in my anxiety and neurotic disorders rather than praying on a bima.

But recently a good friend of my asked me to attend Yom Kippur services, and so I put down my bacon cheeseburger, strapped on my teffilin and left for the synagogue for the first time in 5 years (Actually I embellished: I don’t own teffilin, it’s a tad bit too S&M for my tastes.)

So this Looney Bin walks into a bar...

Every once in a while, you get locked (literally, locked) in a room with a crazy person.  Nowhere to go, no one else with you, no window to jump out of.  Just you, crazy-eyes and a stack of papers you'll be filing together for the next 40 years or when you find a better job, which ever comes first. 
 
Crazy-town talked without taking a breath for roughly 45 minutes, a favorite word of hers being "polyamorous", which quickly became my favorite word when recounting this story to anyone that would listen. 
 
I'm not sure what it is about me that makes people feel like they can open up and tell me extremely graphic details about their lives but it's a curse I've had to deal with for years.  However, I've been in enough of these "I'm going to try to shock you with my sexual past" scenarios that I know that no reaction is the best reaction.  They just keep fishing, you keep on swimming.  Usually, I'm unable to contain my judgement.  I'm a judger.  If you're weird, I will tell you how weird you are.  Yesterday, however, I showed an enviable amount of restraint.  I could feel her aching for me to ask, "wait a second, you SHARED a boyfriend with your gay boyfriend? gay? polyamorous? I am close-minded to your exploits!" but instead I nodded and said, "oh, yes that sounds like a good exercise in controlling jealousy!"
 
More examples of my enviable restraint:
 
Crazy: And THEN I got kicked out of the polyamorous arrangement and my gay ex went and lived with our shared boyfriend!
Kate: [why the FUCK is it always the disgusting people that engage in this type of behavior?!] Where do they live in the city?  The South End is nice.
 
Crazy: I still get razor blades in the mail from my gay ex's stalker!  I fear for my life!
Kate: [a gay stalker is not interested in a crazy fag hag who doesn't tweeze.] Like do they come in a package or an envelope?
 
Crazy: I get free karate lessons from a local dojo so I can protect the lives of me and my gay ex.
Kate: [Again, you're not what the gay stalker wants.  Your efforts are futile.] I used to babysit a kid who did karate.
 
Crazy: I used to get really depressed about it but now I write Live Action Role Play online.
Kate: [of course you do.] writing can be therapeudic.
 
Let it also be said that as she told me this polyamorous, suicidal, bi-curious saga, she was clipping her nails.  The clippings piled up on the table and, timed perfectly with the denoument of her perverse yarn, she scooped them up in her hands and threw them in the trash where they made the tiniest of tap-tap noises as they fell against the garbage bag.
 
There is no excuse to be THAT weird at 27.  None.  I'm 27 and my eccentricities go as far as occassionally dipping my pizza crust in Diet Coke and loving the show "Supersize vs Superskinny".  Crazy-town was all around fucking weird.  I don't understand HOW one gets like that and more importantly, why do these people always seem to think that I'm the one who will get it?  Because I still have nerd-rage from high school, I sometimes worry that their confidences mean I'm one of them?  Maybe I only think I'm cooler than they are?  Why else would they think they could talk to me, confide in me?
 
Fuck that, I'm way cool and totally not polyamorous with gay dudes and dojos.

gooooood morning!

Two things that everyone will relate to that are upsetting.

1. I dropped my beautiful white iPhone for the first time since I got it back in April. We're talking wet concrete, a purely cosmetic case and now a scratched top right corner. The worst thing about dropping something like this is the regret felt afterward. The intense, self loathing regret. What was I thinking, carrying that third shopping bag? Do I think I'm some kind of super woman that can carry three shopping bags? Do i think im exempt from the rules of physics and gravity and shit? You didn't even have to bring those bags to the car. You just did because you wanted to kill 57744 birds with one stone because you're LAZY. You're a lazy person. Stop killing birds with stones! It's pointless! It's all pointless!

So there's that.

Which brings us to...

2. Nothing compares to the mental defeat that is running for a train as it pulls away, doors open, train conductor staring at you stone faced as you yell "what the fuck? You're going 2 miles an hour! Let me jump on the fucking train!" Hobos jumped on trains all the time and they did just fine.

After missing the train, I drove in to work, making ms an hour late...be that as it may, as I mentioned yesterday, I am temping. Therefore no one noticed I was missing.

I suppose that can be mental defeat number 3.

So tell me, friends, lovers and readers! How was YOUR morning? Any murderous blackouts to speak of?

Greetings from my concrete tomb

Temping can do interesting things to ones psyche. The pay is crap but the work is less than minimal so it evens out. My ass hurts from sitting on it for so long. I'm sincerely regretting the papusa I had for lunch because my cinderblock office has no windows and now it smells like the neglected boudoir of a Mexican hooker fresh out of soap. It's an improvement over the usual smell of dust and broken dreams.

I was just handed a discharge file to assemble, meaning I have to gather and put together the information necessary to fire some shmuck who missed work too much and wasn't clever enough to cover his tracks with "sick babies" and "occasional bouts of violent diarrhea", as one employee graphically cited. I feel like George Clooney in "Up in the Air" only less silver foxy and way less likely to bang anyone I meet at work.

Auditions are dumb.

Yesterday I walked into a room with a bunch of strangers and found myself being dry humped, strangled, had a chair thrown at, and was then returned to the world as if nothing had happened. And no, this was not an orgy or a group assembled from a sketchy craigslist ad. This was an audition. This was an audition for a highly lauded theater company. This was an audition for a stable paying theater job in New York City.

And this is where I talk about how auditions are fucking dumb.

This is How Hireable I Am

My name is Kate and I am one of the unemployed masses you hear about on TV.  Whenever they talk about unemployment on the news they always cut to some harried woman with poorly fitted clothes and blotchy skin.  She’s tense, she talks about bills, the world looks pretty bleak.  I refuse to become this person because being mildly attractive is all I have going for me right now.  And by mildly, I mean extremely.

As an unemployed person, I have to write a lot of cover letters.  I laud my achievements in multitasking, prioritizing and [fill in the stock quality employers like].  However, as my job search drags on, I’m finding it harder and harder to play it cool.  Closing with “thank you for your consideration and I look forward to hearing from you soon” feels a little hard to get considering my situation. And so, for your enjoyment and my catharsis, I’m going to write the cover letter my hopeless job search has spawned.  We begin:

To Whom It May Concern:

My name is Kate and I’m writing to apply for the [insert job that I'm totally qualified for...me and 100 other people that have submitted resumes through some vast online portal where they'll either get lost or forgotten].  I’m a graduate from Emerson College with a degree in Writing, Literature and Publishing.  I know that this is essentially a hobby and I’m totally with you.  You see, I’m one of those middle class white girls whose parents encouraged careers in the arts because their parents stifled their creativity.  I did the struggling artist thing throughout college, bartended and wrote stand-up comedy.  I’d seen RENT, I knew the drill.  I now understand that my writing talents would have proven more lucrative in the marketing field or PR but no one explained this to me because I went to a large, inner city high school where simply not being pregnant earned you a spot on the honor roll. 

Since graduating, I’ve been teaching drama and working as a teacher’s aide in Belmont, MA.  This was all working fine until budgets got cut and I met one-too-many 30-somethings with Masters degrees working in the same $16/hr position that I was.  Things seemed hopeless, I decided to transition careers and move into an office environment.  As a young, educated 20-something who is not an idiot, I thought this would be a clean shift.   

While my resume might contain lots of teaching experience, I possess much of the skills needed to be a valuable asset to your company.  First of all, have you been to a second grade classroom recently?  Those kids need to be walked though everything.  Sometimes they pee their pants and you have to deal with that while also explaining fractions. 

If hired, I would provide your office with snark, intellect and good old-fashioned gusto.  If you're a creepy boob-leering boss, I'm your (34C) gal.  I'm at the point where mild sexual harassment is fine, just give me dental insurance-my wisdom teeth are coming in.  

I’ve included my resume as an attachment.  Please note the above average vocabulary and professional format.  I mean it.  It took me a really long time.  If you need any more information, such as references, writing samples, childhood awards, middle school superlatives (tallest in the 7^th grade!), blood type, my first born child, don’t hesitate to call me at: 

PHONE NUMBER!!!! 

[If I can find a way to make this light up and beep like a car alarm that would be a plus]

Call me any time, potential employer.  It’s not like I’m doing anything.

Sincerely,

Kate 

I would then include this picture to show I mean business:

We're back! now with more RAGE

I got my evaluation from work a few days ago and under the categories of “Fun” and “Friendly” I was given “unsatisfactory.”

Let’s back that up for a second.

I received a document that had been milled over by a team of managers, approved of by corporate, and then ratified by the human resources department to be used as part of my official transcript.

And all of those people, all those many hands that tainted that document, agreed that I, Max, was neither “fun” nor “friendly.”

“It’s not that you’re doing a bad job,” My boss said. “ You just look like you hate what you’re doing. All the time.”

She said this last part with a bit of an upward inflection, waiting for me to correct her. But I couldn’t really. I merely grunted and signed the bottom of the paper – making sure to make my handwriting devoid of any sort of “flourish” that might shatter my un-fun and hostile demeanor.

The time I got 3 head injuries in one week

Hospitals hate me. So do tax payers. When news reporters and conservatives argue over the airwaves about illegal immigrants being a leech to modern society and point to the high numbers of illegals visiting hospitals- they seem to be forgetting the number one cause of hospital debt in this country today: Max Bisantz's Emergency Room Visits.

I'm not sure if being Jewish causes hypochondria, if it is a learned behavior or a genetic defect, but I do know that it definitely makes my family treat the emergency room like most people treat the cold and sinus aisle at CVS. Stuffy nose? Emergency room. Headache? You should probably see a doctor. My favorite emergency room visit, however, definitely goes to my sister after she discovered strange bumps on her tongue:

My sister: Ever get bumps on your tongue?
Me: Yea all the time, what did you eat?
My sister: What do you mean?
Me: Did you eat anything weird, any spicy? That's what causes them.
My sister: Oh
Me: So what did you eat?"
My sister: Mexican food. And pineapple.
Me: Was it spicy?
My sister: Yes
Me: And where are you calling from?
My sister: The hospital.

However these past few weeks I managed to make up for all my phony emergency room visits by logging in a real one. I broke my nose.

Well not my nose. Not the bone. The cartilage. Well, it's not broken, it' "disrupted." I personally wasn't aware that my cartilage was so sensitive to begin with. Disrupted? All I can think of is this weird white bendable mass with shocks of unkempt hair, wearing glasses, and sitting at a desk pouring over books on Proust until finally he slams them shut in protest and proclaims "get that boy to turn down that damn radio! I'm working in here and I mustn't be disrupted!" How is a nose disrupted? Regardless that's what the X-Rays show.

The true story is: I walked into a glass door at work. Yes. However, to my defense this is not as dumb as it sounds. 4 people walked into this glass door in one week, so much so that the hotel I work at had to put up decals on the doors to avoid further injury. It is one man's job exclusively to polish these glass doors. I hate this man. I hate these doors.

The good news about all of this is that in breaking my nose, I bled all over the restaurant, so much blood I cannot believe I didn't pass out - which was really quite funny considering the restaurant is brand new and so expensive you want to claw your eyes out.
The bad news was that Michael C Hall was in the restaurant at the time.
The even worse news is that the doctor's can't fix a disrupted cartilage but just wait and watch while I grew into an even older and Jewier looking person than my genetics already had me out to be.

I should've figured that my hospital Karma would kick in. Oh yes, my other 2 head injuries involved 4 stitches to the scalp on what can only be discribed as my first of surely innumerable unnecessary plastic surgeries I will receive in my life.

Kate's Edit 4/6/11 7:24 AM:


You didn't think you could write a hypochondria entry and I WOULDN'T have a million things to add.  I've been turning headaches into tumors, colds into AIDS and hangnails into flesh-eating bacteria that would eventually kill me for YEARS.  I'm late for work so this will have to be quick.  I can't let this entry go by without sharing the POT-INDUCED HERPES ER VISIT OF '06.

I attended a small liberal arts college's writing program where pot smoking was more common than unprotected sex and thinly-veiled "fictional" short stories about girls losing their virginity combined.  It was a constant stench of marijuana, Upper Crust Pizza from the dumpster (that's a story for later) and general B.O. caused by lack of motivation to shower.

One fateful night, I'd smoked just enough to feel slightly paranoid, though I'm not blaming the following story on my smoking.  I'm paranoid enough as it as, often attributing lengthy colds to the onset on AIDS because that's what Web MD says and despite negative tests and a 4 year long monogamous relationship, I am self-centered enough to assume that my eventual demise will be tragic and unexpected.  "AIDS?  But she's never been unprotected in her life!  It was just a little cold!  How could she have known?"  Anyway, that's an issue I'm working on.

So anyway, I'm in the bathroom, extra paranoid from my indulgences and I decide to look at my tongue: COVERED in bumps along the back, almost in a line...placed so uniformly that you would think they were there for a reason...not a practical reason, no, no.  A DEADLY REASON.  So I call my mom.  Because that's what practical people do.  And as an equally practical person, my mother books it to Boston to take me where?  The Emergency Room.  On the way there, the conversation can only be described as the most awkward and emotionally scarring moment of my life.

Mom:  So...these bumps on your tongue...you ever, uuuuuuh...give....oral....sex?
Me (realizing now that it MUST be herpes and damn mother-daughter awkwardness, I'm getting to the bottom of this!): Um....yes.
Mom:  And the semen.  What do you. um.  do with it?
Me: shock and awe
Mom: Because I know it might seem okay to, you know.  Do that.  But it can be dangerous, let me tell you.  Swallowing can be dangerous.

Cut to the ER, 2 hours later.  A doctor comes in, laughing at the girl who gave a BJ once and says "yes.  those are your taste buds."

You'd think I'd have learned from that situation but about 4 months ago, they were inflamed again due to spicy foods.  Nope.  It had to be something deadly.  Not herpes, of course.  I love my boyfriend and we are as monogamous as the swans in the Public Gardens (swans mate for life anyway, but these particular swans are the only ones in the garden so they're like.  together.  forever.  I think someone once told me that they were actually two girls and thus LESBIAN swans but love is love and Mike and I are just like the lesbian swans in the Public Gardens.)  But I was convinced there was something seriously wrong with my mouth.  ER visit, yadda yadda.  Those pesky taste buds again.  Why would someone make something so useful look so lethal?

Don't judge me.

aaaaaaand we're back.

I feel like Max and I have gotten lazy and haven't updated in a very long time.  too long of a time.  It's almost awkward to just start writing again without at least addressing the fact that we are lazy.  So that's the long and short of it.  Anyway, moving on.  We're toying with new stuff to do, seeing as writing witty posts can be hard when you're about to graduate from theater school and work all day with screaming 7 year old children.  Creative juices tend to stop flowing when you're about to be really poor and you've spent most of your day watching misguided children eat their own boogers.  Yes, apparently kids are still doing that and it is still just as nauseating.

Anyway.  New beginning.  Now here is a picture of a ballerina and a puppy.

Image from here

We're taking this show on the road

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If we're ever going to get a whirlwind book deal by 2013, we need to get the ball rolling.

Follow our blog here and on bloglovin.com and we'll thank you on the dedication page of our first memoir.  We're thanking Selena on the second.

Temple of Gold - or - How my Education Failed Me

After a raucous conversation about the validity and unsettling prevalence of the phenomenon known as “lucid dreaming” I realized that maybe my brain isn’t quite up to the level it should be. If you’ve never heard of the phrase before, “lucid dreaming” is the idea that you can control your dreams while experiencing them, or at the very least, become aware that your dreams are entirely fiction. And if you’re anything like me, you’ve assumed that this concept was created by Christopher Nolan in Inception. However, apparently a lot of people experience this and I am just completely out of the loop.

“You mean you have dreams where you know you are dreaming?” I inquire.

“Yea,” my coworkers replied while casually buffing their nails, “every once in a while.”

I continued on.

“And in these dreams, when you realize this, you can change the course of action?”

“Well obviously,” they responded, agitated by my naiveté. “Why would I keep doing something I didn’t feel like doing?”

I was floored, if not by the concept, but by how nonchalant they acted- as if summoning the nightly powers of a Navajo medicine woman was completely blasé. One of my coworkers went so far as to say she controlled her dreams entirely, thinking about what storylines to experience before going to bed and then systematically executing each plot point with its corresponding REM cycle.

“It’s fun!” she said, “I’ll be hooking up with James Franco in my cabana house when George Clooney comes in to check out the pH levels in the pool!”

At least nervous fidgeting burns calories.

It's customary that when you start dating someone, you should reveal certain things about yourself slowly, so as to keep the mystery and excitement alive. Don't tell him immediately that you once dabbled in glass blowing or that golden showers are kind of your thing. Just when he thinks he knows all there is to know about you, BAM. Pee on his face. These are the kinds of things that keep relationships humming.

I had (non-urine related) things that I was eager to slowly show off to my boyfriend of 3 and a half years and he also had (non-urine related) things to share with me. For instance, he pooped his pants (a tragic result of The Shart) on his first day of the 6th grade just as he made it up the hill to the bus stop. I heard this 2 years into our relationship and it definitely made us stronger.

Right now, at this moment, I'm in a situation where I'm wondering if I should reveal something about myself that will blow the barn door open on his understanding of my neuroses. He knows I'm mostly always either nervous, cold or scared so I'm not sure if I should bring him into this very dark, very inconvenient aspect of my already shaky personality. He's seen me park and re-park my car, wake up in the middle of the night to replace the batteries on the carbon monoxide detector JUST IN CASE and he's seen me steal temporary tow-zone signs so that if I get towed, I can cite the many mistakes on said sign. Do I really want to add one more heaping pile to the batch of crazy he's come to love?

I bought a dress while on Newbury Street in Boston. It is adorable and lovely and I can wear it with tall boots and I really really like it. I tried it on in a small. It fit great. Saw a tear in it. Grabbed another dress with no tear. Paid for it. Brought it home. Excitedly tried it on with said tall boots. It was massive. I had grabbed a large. I feverishly called the store. A very incompetent sounding sales girls said if she could find it, she would hold it for me. IF SHE COULD FIND IT. This is not sitting well with me and it's leaving far too much to chance. I need a plan. I casually ask my boyfriend if he'd like to have dinner in Boston. Now. He says he'll eat in Boston and he'll drive me to the store so I can return my dress. He's understood every facet to my desperate inquiry except for the very important part: NOW.

So I'm reading this blog to him as I write it, hoping he'll see through the comedic nuances and understand my struggle, hurriedly grab his keys, whisk me to his car and speed down Storrow Drive with his hand resting on my knee, assuring me that everything will be okay. Instead, he's eating hummus in his boxers and filling out his tax forms. WHAT THE FUCK. I'm using italics.

So basically, the quandary remains: do I continue to hide under the guise of comedy and nonchalance and hope that this dress will still be there in 2 hours (2 HOURS!!) or do I rush him out the door and risk revealing way too much about what goes on in my neurotic Jewish head?

This blog took me 20 minutes to write. That's how much time it takes for someone else to find, try on and buy a dress. Just think about THAT, because I know I will be for the next 2 HOURS.

A positive update will hopefully follow.

--Kate

If his status ain't hood...

When it comes to dating and men in general, it seems that most people have their types. Some – the tall dark and handsome. Others – the blonde haired, blue eyed jock.

As for me?

It turns out I like thugs.

But not just hip hop loving men, or those dreadfully pansied homothugs that traipse up and down Christopher Street by the PATH train at 3 in the morning. No no. I’m talking hard ass thugs. Think Tupac and up the ante a notch or two. I’m interested in someone that could beat the shit out of me if I looked at him the wrong way and make it look like an accident. If you’ve been convicted of a felony I’m pretty sure we’re compatible and the more teardrops on your face the better. Because what’s sexier than danger? …And by danger I mean dating someone that may or may not have committed manslaughter in the last ten years.

How I long for the days when I can iron my boo’s dew rag while he’s passed out on the couch. How I yearn to polish his grill in a boiling pot of water and baking soda. How I crave… think of another blatantly racist and offensive stereotype and you’re not far off. That. Whatever you think that is, I crave that.

Now, I'm well aware that there could be some complications with this. But I promise, I've thought this through.

1) A lot of thugs, not all, but a lot are incredibly homophobic. Now to most, this would seem like a deal breaker - but to me it’s just another obstacle on our way to holy matrimony: who doesn’t fall for a game of hard-to-get? When 50 cent raps:

“look him hes a faggot kick him kick his fuckin ass”

one could see an example of bigotry and hatred – but, honestly, I just see a challenge. A challenge I’m willing to take on- with gusto!

2) Would I fit in with my new husband's friends? Would they think a Banana Republic wearing Jew would have any sort of street cred?

This is also not a problem. If my semester spent in Harlem teaching a crew of 12-year-old girls how to double-dutch taught me anything, it’s how to bullshit that you know what you’re talking about in regards to Hip Hop when you absolutely don’t. The first step is to immediately shit-talk Mos Def – if only for the sole reason that every other white person in America claims to like him. This will at least set you apart and make people curious towards your uneducated point of view. If you need to go further to prove yourself, name-drop KRS-ONE or Zulu Nation. These references are neither cliché, obvious, nor outdated and you need not know anything about them to make them land. These two simple steps are sure fire ways to land you street cred at any block party, church raffle, or baby mama’s niece’s baptism.

The good news in all of this is that I’ve already prepped my parents about my future husband. I admit, they seemed a little hesitant at first, but really opened up to the idea marvelously after I promised to give them an hour heads up before I brought my man home- enough to give them ample time to hide the valuables.

Because it’s worth it. As Destiny’s Child sang, I do need a soldier, but I’m not exactly sure when he’ll sail on into my life. But until then, I’ll be here, color coordinating my sweaters and baking shortbread cookies, just waiting, waiting, for my boo-to-be.

-Max

Denial is a Drug

I pulled my chest muscle mixing brownie batter.

When I first realized that this had happened, I felt unjustly punished, seeing as I don't go to the gym and only people who work out should suffer muscle strains. It's a risk that every athlete takes and they just have to deal with the consequences. I, however, never signed up for that risk. In fact, I (not ran) but slowly walked away from that risk at a meandering to moderate pace so why am I being punished?

I am not a person who works out. I'm just not. Could I stand to lose a bit of pudge under my belly button? Yes, of course. But I was blessed with the family genes that Max missed out on, which is the gene that makes you appear as if you look AWESOME naked. Whether I do or not is debatable and solely dependent on the softness of the light filtering in through my white gauzy curtains. But when I'm clothed, I look like I'd be bangin' under a Brookstones magnifying mirror in fluorescent lighting. And that's good enough for me. Poor Max has to WORK at a gym to achieve that misleading effect. I envy him for both his efforts and well-deserved achievements. His regimen has recently earned him some pecs, or so it seems...the Family Effect does some powerful things.

My below the belly button pudge is telling me that the fact that I DON'T go to the gym is why I strained my muscle--that no self-sufficient adult relies on brownie batter-mixing as an aerobic workout. But for now, I'm just going to ice my battle wound, eat my brownies and stay in good lighting.

At least I make this look good

So my boyfriend is nearing the end of a psych 101 course. Being a 101 class, it provides perfect, 1-dimensional explanations of psychological disorders to diagnose myself with. According to this class, I'm a raving lunatic. However, I think my most disturbing conclusion came today with a very quick, 5 minute phone call from my boyfriend after psych class.

Tonight, the professor spent the final 30 minutes of class talking about some of the more common neuroses and disorders. My boyfriend excitedly called me afterwards and told me he had discovered that I was a total narcissist. Apart from the conventional definition of a narcissist (my brother and I have made our vanity very clear), someone "suffering" from this condition has an overwhelming and unrelenting need to be coddled and reassured that they are indeed loved above all other things in this world. This need eventually becomes so suffocating that the person doing the coddling becomes exhausted and takes on the narcissist's mental issues as if they were their own. "You become physically exhausted just being around the person," my boyfriend recited. To which I replied, "you say that like it's a bad thing."

Because my boyfriend is an understanding guy, not one to throw stones in glass houses, he didn't judge me or express any real alarm at this discovery...which led me to the completely misguided conclusion that my psychological shit wasn't a problem that I should deal with before it worsens, but rather an enviable trait that sets me apart from all the mentally sound gals out there. It's charming that I will gently weep after a hard day at work and then ask my boyfriend "[sniffle] Am I special?" It's lovable that I decided early on in this post that I wanted to use the word "myriad" and haven't had a good spot for it yet, causing my anxiety to get higher and higher as the word count goes up. My being psychologically "complex" could be my thing--my je ne sais quoi. Some girls have infectious laughter, sparkling eyes--I have fleeting obsessive-compulsive symptoms that come and go with my menstrual cycle. Win.

Also, apparently people with excessive anxiety (this is the part where Max and I hold hands in solidarity) are startled by loud noises...like baby deer.

Myriad.

XOXOOOO Kate

I'm the best fucking neighbor

So I'm sitting in my kitchen in my underwear eating sausage (insert joke) and all of a sudden I hear a knock on the door. Which makes me panic because I live in an apartment building, it's ten o'clock at night, I don't know anyone and I'm playing music too loudly to pretend like no one is home which is my usual tactic. So I freeze.

Obviously I do what any other normal person does, which is move my sausage from the kitchen table (visible by the door) and hide it on the kitchen counter. I do this because I find it embarrassing to be eating by yourself even in your own apartment. This, I imagine, is what fat people do and I'd prefer to give off the idea that I'm on a strict Black Swan diet- nothing but chewing gum and a dream. Regardless...

The point is, I turn off my music, hide my sausage, and finally open the door to see who's knocking. It's then that I realize that I'm not wearing pants. This, surprisingly, is secondary to the story.

Standing in front of me is a small frail, tired looking woman in her mid 30s with streaky blonde hair. She's wearing a pink and purple sweat suit, but you can make your own judgment calls on that one (I did.) Next to her is a giant white dog. She is holding two trays full of raw peanut butter cookie dough.

She is my downstairs neighbor that I've only heard of in folklore from other tenants. She is bat shit crazy.

This is weird. It's weirder when she walks right into my apartment.

"Hi" I say, as she sweeps into my house, dog in tow.

"Hi." She starts to look around my apartment, at my half eaten sausage on the counter, and then settles her eyesight onto my groin.

"Oh, I forgot pants. Sorry."

She doesn't smile. Why am I apologizing to her? Why is she in my apartment? Seriously, where ARE my pants?

"I hope it's ok for the dog to be in here."

Luckily it is, the dog is cute, but this is already REALLY weird.

"My stove is broken, and I need to bake these, so I was wondering if I could use your stove."

She continues to tell me precisely what temperature the stove should be, for how long the cookies should be baked, and what color and thickness they appear when finished.

"Thanks."

She then grabs her giant dog and leaves.

And I'm left alone with a pan full of raw cookie dough and very intensive baking instructions.

Let me recap:

So basically I have to cook this woman's baked goods and the success of failure of these peanut butter cookies relies solely on me. Sorry, bitch... what?!

I look at the cookies, and then turn the dial on the stove like she said. And suddenly my panic is replaced with a really unwarranted sort of RAGE. These cookies, quite frankly, look really unsubstantial. Shitty, is more like it, they look haphazard and shittily made, with a stupid fork indentation in a criss-cross pattern on the top to make up for a certain amount of effort, but it's not fooling anyone. These are bullshit cookies.

Look, neighbor, if you wanna use my stove, that's totally cool. If she had run up here in a cocktail dress, heels, and a tray of canapes and frantically explained that in the middle of her dinner party the stove had stopped working and she HAD to get the amuse bouche on the table - then FINE. You can use my stove, and then leave to entertain your guests. I'll help you out, I'll cook it. (And not even REALLY, i remember one dinner party where the stove literally caught fire and I couldn't cook my kugel, but we made do.)

The fact is, I at least need to see some effort on your part. I at least need to see that you TRIED as much as you could before you decided to walk upstairs and inconvenience someone else. Leave me to finish baking your cheap tollhouse imitation peanut butter cookies?

Let me ask you a question, lady: How much work did you really put into these cookies? Because the only effort I see is unwrapping the sad log of tollhouse dough, plopping it unceremonially onto a baking sheet, and calling it a day. This is unacceptable.

I call my sister to give me advice on how to handle this situation, but my sister has the rare gift of ignoring all my concerns and focusing on new parts of my problems that give me even greater anxiety:

"What did she look like?" she says

"I dunno, that's not the point. Um... young, ratty hair. Sweat pants."

"Sweat pants? She sounds like a clinger."

My sister informs me that this woman is either looking for a hot young lover, a new best friend, or is completely ready to slice me open and feed me to her dog. The latter makes me the most nervous, although the thought of listening to her banal problems or initiating any sort of sexual act with the woman is almost as horrifying.

"Stand OUT IN THE HALL. Put them on a trivet by the door. Knock and then stand on the first step: DO NOT GO IN," my sister warns.

Which would work if I had anything resembling a trivet in my kitchen.

"Cooling rack?"

Please.

Finally the cookies are done and I get some pot holders out and prepare to bring them downstairs. This time I put some pants on. I exit my apartment, making sure to lock the front door in case this whole thing is a sting operation and she has agents stationed in the staircase to go in and steal my shit while I'm delivering these peanut butter cookies to her. I know, I know, but after the conversation with my sister, anything and everything is up for grabs.

"Come in."

I don't. This is how people get killed; they walk into unsuspecting houses with trays of cooling baked goods, the last thing they remember is a chlorophyll soaked rag and for the next ten years they're working in a white slavery ring somewhere on the outskirts of Mumbai.

She opens the door and grabs the scalding hot plates with her bare hands. It is a staggering feat.

"Oh thanks. You want one?" she asks.

She stares at me and I stare at her. The plates are scalding hot but she doesn't flinch. She doesn't even blink.

"I do," I say, giving in to the intolerable pressure. BUT I DON'T! A novice mistake. Slowly I take a cookie from the tray and she proceeds to watch me eat it.

It's poison, I think, keep it stored in your cheeks and spit it out when she closes the door.


But I don't. I swallow it. It's pretty delicious.

"Thanks again," she says. "You're the best baker."

Then she shuts the door, and I walk back upstairs into my apartment to decompress.

I'm left with a lot of questions:

Why does this woman not have a functioning oven? Peanut butter cookies are fine and simple, but what if this becomes a trend? What if she needs something souffled, or brings up a tray of delicately sugared puff pastries? What if the rest of her appliances fail and she leaves me in charge to freeze her ice trays or thaw her chicken? And why do I feel responsible for the success or failure of all these endeavors that have nothing to do with me?

I tell you why I feel responsible:

Because I'm a good fucking neighbor.

-Max