It's Whoreticulture Friday! Issue 81

Whoreticulture: The industry and science of whores and whore-related topics. Whoreticulturists work and conduct research in the disciplines of OB-GYNery, Brazilian waxers and shavers, adultery, personal hygiene mavens and easy women. The word is composite, from two words, whore, from Greek meaning "harlot" or "dear", and the word "culture". Like NPR's Science Friday, Whoreticulture Friday exists to educate and spark discussion on the science of Whorology. Whoreticulture Friday is not for children. Or squeamish people. Or Mother-In-Laws. Or people I work with. Or anyone who lives within 10 miles of me. Or parents of my children's friends. Or people going to estate sales.



Today's topic: Krazy Boob




I try to have a Zen attitude about most things in life. Really, I do.


The problem is that I inherited my Dad's ability to be overly high strung about things, and there are times when I'm not mad, but people think I'm mad because I'm focused on getting something done and not screwing it up, because BELIEVE ME, I have great ability to screw things up.  I spend most days trying to anticipate which priceless piece of Wedgewood china I'm juggling is going to hit the ground and shatter.


When I get uptight, I try to think, "Hey, I'm not a victim of genital mutilation in Rwanda.  I don't have leprosy.  My children are not in prison at this time.  I remember my name and address.  I currently have my original teeth.  Wine and coffee have not yet been restricted from my diet."  This is my mental version of 'count your blessings' - things could always be worse, no?  That said, this week has been a little bit WTF.

My extremely awesome neighbor bought these for me. 

She also buys Gruet and invites me over.  I heart her.

First, it was the flags.  After that whole debacle, I drove to the high school on Wednesday over my half hour lunch to get the van with 87 freshly dried flags and take them back to the Optimists.  I pulled into the lot, and ....ohdearGod....the van was gone.  As I walked to the school office, I wondered about liability if the school cargo van was stolen on my watch.  It turns out the maintenance people at the school had another set of keys, and they moved it - WHEW - so I got in and drove it across town.  In my Jambu wedge shoes and prairie mini-dress.  I felt a little badass, I'm not gonna lie.

Second, I tore my boob.  On Wednesday, I got ready for work and noticed a little pain in Rightie, but didn't think much of it.  While talking to a co-worker, I noticed it hurt again, so when I got back to my desk, I stuck my hand down the front of said prairie dress and adjusted my cup, much like an MLB baseball player. (It should be noted here that I didn't spit.)  Suddenly, I'm convulsing in pain, because it turns out that Rightie had some fluid come out that hardened like Krazy Glue.  Remember the Krazy Glue commercial with the guy in the hardhat glued to the beam?

Well, the yellow hard hat is my boob and the beam is my bra.  And I sort of accidentally ripped it off.  So then there was bleeding.  And Band-Aids.  And I had a little secret in my bra all day while I walked around the office.  I know, male co-workers, that's pretty hot.  Bidding's over, CH won.


So I go to Book Club, my go-to panel of women on all life topics, and after we discussed 50 Shades of Grey and I found out that most of them have regular and spontaneous orgasms (What?  Broccoli is on sale?  OH GOOOODDDDD...) I brought up my boob, and they all stopped talking and two people said, "Call your doctor tomorrow."  And then everyone sort of awkwardly stood up and prepared to leave, and then whispered among themselves about who was going to start the casserole schedule for my family.  (I'm of course kidding, since I know some of you are reading this.  Remember, I'm an entertainer, not a historian.)


Instead of calling my doctor, I got on Web MD, which as anyone who does Web MD knows, it always drills down to cancer.  Of course, Web MD said, It's either Mastitis, OR, if you aren't nursing anyone, it's probably a rare cancer.  I still didn't call my doctor, I had a glass of pinot and then texted, FB'd and called my OB-GYN high school friend, Paige.  (I have been known to call her answering service semi-drunk and demand to know why she isn't at a party.  It's a miracle I haven't been blocked.)  Paige asked me questions only a doctor or someone who knew you before you got your period can, and we determined that I should see my doctor but it's probably just an infected duct.  But I'm still wearing a Band-Aid on my boob.  Now you know.  CH is one lucky bastard.


Third, my neighbor is having an Estate Sale starting today, and there is a strong possibility I'm going to hit someone with a shovel this weekend.  I love me a good estate sale, but some people like to see if they can actually drive their car through the estate sale, or pull up on lawns, or block driveways.  It's like someone is handing out free cigarettes in prison, or Justin Beiber is visiting middle school.  The crazy just oozes out of people.


BUT.  It's Friday.  I'm not a victim of genital mutilation in Rwanda.  I don't have leprosy.  My children are not in prison at this time.  I remember my name and address.  I currently have my original teeth.  Wine and coffee have not yet been restricted from my diet.  So honestly, it's all good.


Happy Whoreticulture Friday, and have a great weekend!

When I Started Stalking the Kids

I'd like to start this post with the thoughts that plague me all the time anymore:

I'm so, so sorry, Mom and Dad.
I was wrong.

Oh, that's right.  Twenty-five years later, I am finally contrite.  Allow me to make a short list of things for which I am sorry, and these are just off the top of my head:

1. Fake orthodontist appointments
2. Beer bongs
3. Street sign stealing
4. TP-ing
5. Prolific swearing
6. Distracted driving
7. Unfinished homework
8. Skinny jeans that weren't purchased as skinny jeans
9. Last minute rides
10. General behavioral issues

And that was all before I was 18.  Much of it before I was 16.  Oy. I remember when I was in Junior High, as we used to call it in the olden days, and my group of friends would get together, and we would say we were going to the movies, get dropped off, wait for the parent to drive away, and then go hang out outside the bar down the street or just generally roam around.  One girl, whom I loved then and still love now, had a mom who was rightly suspicious of us.  She would drop her daughter off, and then we would see her gray conversion van across the street and think, "Oh Christ, now we HAVE to go to the movie!!!"   I look back now and think, "I would SO be in that conversion van!!"

I'm old enough now that I can look at the Courtney Love v. Courtney Love's parents showdown and think, "Those poor people."

Nah.  I was always Team Parents on that one.

And I even liked Hole.

This weekend, I became Stalker Parent.  Helicopter Parent.  Parent hiding in the bushes.  Parent in the van across the street.  And it's really not because I don't trust my kids - it's because I don't trust THE REST OF THE WORLD.

I started the weekend by watching Youngest Daughter perform in a dance team thing a the football game, one of those grade-schoolers-hang-out-with-the-dance-team-for-an-afternoon-and-get-a-shirt things.  The little girls finished, and YD wanted to run around the football game with her friends.  Luckily, another parent offered to take YD and her friends away from the game and have an overnighter at their house.  (LET'S PAUSE WHILE I PLACE THIS "MOTHER OF THE WEEKEND" CROWN ON SAID MOM'S HEAD.  Applause. ) I had to volunteer in the concession stand, so Current Husband was in charge.  Then Oldest Daughter informed us that a group of her friends made plans to go to a haunted house, and they needed a ride, so CH offered to drive them.  He lined up another parent to be the go-to group for The Son and his posse of kids running around, and left. 

Soon, concessions were over, and then the game.  I was walking out with the three boys, all middle schoolers, when some high school boy yells down from the top of the bleachers, "Keep walking, Motherfucker!"  I was on my cell phone with CH taking a crisis call, and I said, "Hold on, CH".  I marched back to the bottom of the bleachers and yelled like a mom should - loudly and awkwardly and full of momma bear bravado.

ME:  "WHAT did you say?"

KID:  *****

ME:  "Do you want to tell me what you yelled at those boys?"
KID:  ***** (possible contemplating spilling his slurpee on me)

ME:  "Well you keep that up and see where it gets you in the future!"
KID:  *****

BAM! 

You TELL him, Julie!  I bet he is shaking in his boots!  Yes!  The dreaded FUTURE comeback!  I'm sure that moment changed that kid's life.  He probably looked at his skanky girlfriend standing next to him and said, "She's right.  I DO need to think about my future.  I should stop with the language and the methamphetamine and pick up a copy of Henry James' 'Portrait of a Lady' for my English report, and then clean my room and get a job and cut back on the red meat.  I'm so glad I attended this football exhibition."

The boys were impressed.  "Dude, your mom is AWESOME" and "It's like having your own bodyguard!" was overheard.  TRANSLATION:  "Dude, your mom is crazy!" and "It's like Thanksgiving when my Aunt Karen gets drunk!"  Middle school boys only get impressed when someone else's mom goes apeshit.

I get back on the crisis call with CH.  He is nonplussed, as he's heard me come unhinged on people before, and by 'people' I mean him.

CH:  "When are you getting home?"

ME:  "Now.  What's up?"

CH:  "You need to drop the boys' off at G's house, and come with me."

ME:  "Where are we going?"

CH:  "Did YOU know where the haunted house is?"

ME:  "Skellington's or Scarington's or something."

CH:  "Did you know it is smack dab in the middle of gangbangerville?  On a Friday night?"

ME:  "It's in Rock Island?"

CH:  "Yeah.  And I saw about 40 cops and a guy trying to break into a car when I left."

ME:  "I'm on my way."

I dropped off the boys and picked up CH.  We drove to Rock Island, which reports a shooting about every three days, and went to the haunted house, which was right on the edge of the bar district on Friday night.  We passed a closed off street with about 10 cop cars and a fire truck where a car had smashed into a building, and a number of other squad cars patrolling the area.  We parked directly across the street from the haunted house, facing it, and I texted Oldest Daughter that we were outside.  We sat in that van and fretted for 40 minutes until the group came out and got into the van, laughing. 

Not wanting to freak the kids out or embarrass OD, I engaged them in conversation about various things while CH clutched the steering wheel in a death grip, imagining it was each of their heads, but as each kid got out of the car, I asked, "So did your parents know you were haunted housing in Rock Island tonight?" every one of them answered, "They knew I was going to a haunted house, but not in Rock Island."  Like DUH, I wouldn't tell them I was in THAT town!

We got home and had a lovely discussion with OD about her new regulations requiring her to submit her social plans in triplicate forms, 72 hours in advance, and that if we find out she left the city without telling us she would be spending a lot of time watching The Golden Girls and eating Milk Duds with her parents on Friday nights.

We went to bed and spoke in whispers about what rotten teens we were, and how lucky we are that OD doesn't do a fraction of the things we did....yet.  And then we made an appointment to get all of the children micro-chipped.

The end.
 

In The Wayback Machine: Bus Ride From Hell

I had other plans for today's blog post. 

For one, I was going to do it yesterday, but as my friend Meem told Current Husband the first time she met him, "There is something you need to know about Julie - she will always, ALWAYS, be late, but she will show up with beer and a good story." Meem said this to CH because she got to his place on time when she traveled to Iowa State to meet him for the first time, and I was late. But I showed up with beer and a story.

So here is your virtual beer - "POP!" - it is open - and your story.  Let's go to a new ADITW feature called, "In The Wayback Machine".  I would like to preface this story by saying that unlike some of my stories, which can be prone to some exaggeration to protect the innocent and confuse the details, this story is certified Hand To God True.  Let us begin:

My mom was here for Labor Day weekend, and it made me harken back to another time when I wanted my mother for Labor Day.  It was my freshman year at Iowa State University, and my mom had just dropped me off a couple of weeks earlier to start my adventure three whole hours from home.  I'd spent the previous eight years dreaming of the moment I could get the heck out of my house, so I felt giddy with the possibilities of college.  Labor Day weekend arrived, and with it, offers of rides home with people who lived in my area.  Was I going home?  Hell, no!  I was a college girl now!

Saturday morning arrived, and I walked out on campus, and it was completely empty.  I assumed the other Freebirds would be out celebrating or something, and it turns out that nearly everyone actually went home.  No big deal, I'll read a book or something.  Crickets...crickets... By noon, I was actually getting homesick.  I called my parents and asked if they would get me.  "No way!" they said, with the party music blaring in the background.  The hot tub was being moved into my room as we spoke.  However, they did say they would pay for me to take the bus to Omaha if I wanted to come back.  And this is where my adventure began.

The Greyhound station in Ames was a nice little college town station.  It was 3 p.m., the sun was shining, the birds were singing.  Thank God for the bus, right?  I bought my ticket and walked down the aisle, wearing my preppy Polo rugby and torn jean shorts, my Walkman ready to go.  As I walked, I took stock of the bus occupants, and I quickly realized I was on the Petri Dish express - every bus cliche was present:  Freshly sprung convicts, runaway teens, nuns, tired-looking women with young snot-nosed children clinging to them.  I took the last empty row and counted my blessings that I got a solo seat.  Soon, an old gentleman came down the aisle and took the seat next to me.  At least he looked nice.  He turned to me, put his mechanical larynx against his throat, and buzzed at me, "HELLO. I AM. ROBERT."  

Oh holy shit, you have GOT to be kidding me.  It was no joke.  Robert just got out of the hospital from having his voicebox removed due to a lifetime of smoking, and let me tell you, Robert was a pretty chatty guy for having no voicebox.  He talked to me for about an hour, when suddenly the sky got noticeably dark.

"IT. LOOKS. LIKE. A. BAD. STORM."  Thanks, Robert.  The bus driver, a woman in her thirties, seemed to get ruffled, and started muttering to herself.  Pretty soon, I could hear tornado sirens going off.  Really?  REALLY!?!  Yes, really.  The bus driver actually got on the intercom and I swear to you she came unhinged.  

"Lawd almighty, I ain't never had nothin' like this happen on my bus.  Look y'all, there is a tornada, and don't axe me what to do 'cause I don't know.  Lawd help us all!  I'm gonna pull over here, and I think y'all needs to get out of the bus and into that ditch, because ain't nothin' good gonna happen if that tornada hits this damn bus."

So she screeches over to the side of the highway, bus rocking in the wind, and we all file off the bus - the nuns, the convicts, the teens, the mothers, Mr. Roboto, and me.  We get into the ditch and sort of sit there for a few minutes in the wind.  It wasn't raining, but it was really dark and windy.  Pretty soon, the convicts are all, "Screw this" and get back on the bus, and the rest of us looked at each other and sort of shrugged our shoulders and said "Ditto".  The bus driver had disappeared, so we sat for a little while and waited for her to show up.  She got back on the bus, and we got on our merry way.

What was normally a three hour trip between Ames and Omaha ended up being a six-hour trip with the various stops and the weather.  We arrived in Omaha after 9 p.m., and if you've never been to the Greyhound station in Omaha, let me tell you what a popular place it is.  It's in the middle of downtown, and it is full of drug dealers, prostitutes, pimps, and pedophiles.  I'm sitting in my little Ralph Lauren shirt, my "I Heart My Sorority" pin on my bag, and cute little Tretorns, my eyes as big as half dollars and my foot nervously tapping the chair leg. 

I needed to trade this......................... for this.

In walks my Dad, and he's looking around, and I swear to you, he couldn't see me.  HELLO!  The place is full of prostitutes and he can't pick out his daughter, who has only been out of the house for two weeks.

Dad found me, after I ran, waving at him, and hugging him for the first time in ten years.  "What's wrong with you?" Dad said, looking shocked and uncomfortable.  "I'm just so happy to see you," I said.  And this is when Dad knew something was very, very wrong.  He REALLY looked around, and said, "Let's get the hell out of here."  Agreed.

And that, my friends, is the last time I boarded a bus that isn't painted safety yellow.  Do any of you have any bus adventures?

Hope you had a terrific Labor Day weekend!

It's Whoreticulture Friday! Issue 37

Whoreticulture: The industry and science of whores and whore-related topics. Whoreticulturists work and conduct research in the disciplines of OB-GYNery, Brazilian waxers and shavers, adultery, personal hygiene mavens and easy women. The word is composite, from two words, whore, from Greek meaning "harlot" or "dear", and the word "culture". Like NPR's Science Friday, Whoreticulture Friday exists to educate and spark discussion on the science of Whorology. Whoreticulture Friday is not for children. Or squeamish people. Or Mother-In-Laws. Or DAUGHTERS OF FRIENDS, YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE!  GO BACK TO FACEBOOK!  NOW!  I MEAN IT!  Or so help me God I will tell your mother.

Today's topic: MILFs

The other day, I checked my junk mail, and next to the usual items concerning the hundreds of medical transcriptionist jobs in my area, the low Viagra prices, and the strangers proposing lucrative business arrangements, was a new type of e-mail for me, and it immediately got my attention:

Subject: - sexually explicit -MILFs!

Single Mothers Looking To Date!

We wanted to let you know right away that there are thousands of MILFs in your city that are looking to meet new people for one night stands and threesomes. These MILFs are beautiful, fun, and extremely sexy!

PRESS HERE to see how beautiful these MILFs look: (MUST BE 18 and OLDER)

You can DATE these MILFs this week!!!

WHOA.  Thousands of MILF's, in MY city, and not only do they want one night stands AND threesomes, but they are extremely sexy and beautiful!!!  And fun!  How DOES my computer do it?  I was just thinking about how I would love nothing more than to spend an evening in a skanky-threesome-one-night-stand-sure-to-be-festering-wounds episode with other women who have used uteruses (uteri?) just like mine!  This was indeed my lucky day.  (You know what's sad?  There's a man who read that last sentence who just felt the stirrings of an erection.  You know it's true.)

What's that?  You don't know what a MILF is?  Let's check Urban Dictionary, the go-to source for Whoreticulture Friday (copied with typos intact, clearly written by a professor):

MILF: "Mother I'd Like (to) Fuck" :mothers, whether married, separated or divorced, that a male individual sees as physical attractive enough to want to have sexual intercourse with them. Just cuz their moms doesn't mean that they don't need a spark in their love life. If they've ever breastfed,they have really responsive nipples and a core of erectile tissue in their breasts. The ones in good shape have worked at regaining control over their vaginas (Kegel exercises).MILFs are usually real careful about birth control, they know accidents happen but they take responsible steps. They want to fuck with abandon, with no romantic complications for their under-19 family.

A MILF is any mother that is sexually desirable.

"A core of erectile tissues"? OR this one:

MILF: Some hot ass mom of a friend's that you wanna do so badly

When you're going out to basketball practice and you see ur best friend's mother bending over to pick some flowers and she's got a thong on Got MILF?

I personally heard about MILFs for the first time in the movie American Pie, when Stifler's Mom was putting the make on Finch.  Meet Jennifer Coolidge, America's MILF:

 "I got some scotch...aged 18 years, 

the way I like it."

However, I was familiar with the concept much earlier.  My high school posse of friends had reunited (and it felt so good) for a weekend about ten years ago (forgive me girls if that is wrong).  Nearly all of us had kids by then, we were probably around 30, and this was a rare night away from the families.  We went out for dinner, feeling spry, and a college-age guy waited on us.  We joked around with him for a while, getting a little tipsy, and then a LOT tipsy, and at one point we said something to him like, "We're moms on the loose!  If you're lucky we'll invite you back to our room!"  And he was visibly shocked and like, "Uh, no thanks."

And that just did it.

After a few moments of stunned silence, we lit into this poor guy.  I remember saying to him, "You go home to your little frat boy roommates and tell them that six EXPERIENCED women invited you back to their hotel room with them, and you refused!" and as he walked away I was saying something like, "We have over 75 years of sexual experience between us!  We can do things you haven't even HEARD of yet!"  

Did he need to know that experience included getting stuck between the bed and the wall, or having a puppy accidentally end up licking someone's balls, or not being able to get the handcuffs off?  No.  It needed to sound provocative, not disturbing.  (And by the way people, only ONE of those things happened to me.)  He was missing out!  On something we weren't even offering, really, but it stung to be shut down.  We were MILFs, for God's sake, before MILFs were even invented!  

So there I was.  Another classy situation, where a tipsy Julie berated a young man for not wanting to participate in an orgy with semi-drunk nursing mothers with attitudes.  I will defend my friends' honor.  The waiter came back, a little apologetic, probably because the tip had not been paid yet.  Were we mad?  No.  We're moms.  We were disappointed in him.  So we spanked him hard and then we put Baby in the corner and cuffed him to the Time Out chair.  Naughty monkey.

Happy Whoreticulture Friday, and have a great weekend!

It's Whoreticulture Friday! Issue 32

Whoreticulture: The industry and science of whores and whore-related topics. Whoreticulturists work and conduct research in the disciplines of OB-GYNery, Brazilian waxers and shavers, adultery, personal hygiene mavens and easy women. The word is composite, from two words, whore, from Greek meaning "harlot" or "dear", and the word "culture". Like NPR's Science Friday, Whoreticulture Friday exists to educate and spark discussion on the science of Whorology. Whoreticulture Friday is not for children. Or squeamish people. Or Mother-In-Laws.


Today's topic: Bella is a whore.


Let me just state for the record that I am, indeed, one of those freaky Twilight lovers. There, I said it. I love the books, I've read them all multiple times, and it's not just because of my daughter. I won't throw her under the bus. And while I think Jacob is just fine, particularly under the tutelage of Taylor Lautner, I am a Team Edward girl.


Watching Eclipse brought home a theme I felt while reading the books:
Bella is a total cock tease.
(BING! Did you hear that? It's the sound of another follower leaving.)

Dig deep within your soul, Twilight people....if Edward or Jacob was your friend in high school, and Bella was on Edward like white on rice during school, but then hopped on the back of a motorcycle to straddle Jacob and tear out of the parking lot in front of Edward, and both of those hot dudes were walking around totally sexually frustrated, you would:

1. Hate Bella for playing them.
2. Have sympathy sex with at least one of them.
3. Both.
4. Call them up and be all, "I just don't get why you put up with that crap Ed, you are all that and a bag, so just let her run around with those mangy cliff-jumpers" OR "You are so much better than this Jake, go find a girl who will scramble her egg on your chest because if she wants that sparkly freesia-scented freak she deserves him!"

I was so pissed during New Moon, because even though Jacob was a great friend and all, you totally knew he wanted to get in Bella's pants, and he wasn't even that subtle about it, and she's like, "Oh, it's okay if we hold hands, because friends can do that" and "I'll hang out with him every single day even though his friends have all told me that he calls me his girlfriend".  I mean, really?  Really Bella? 

Then Eclipse came along, and I was even MORE pissed, because come ON, Edward is BACK, honey!  Hello, remember the whole Romeo and Juliet thing going on in New Moon?  Like if R & J hadn't killed themselves over their true love, maybe Juliet would've looked at Benvolio some night when he was over to play cards with Romeo and said, "maybe we could hold hands and I could tell him I love him, but not in the way I love Romeo.  That would be okay, right?"  No, Juliet.  No it would not.

And then the whole Eclipse sleeping bag scene?  It's great in the movie, don't get me wrong, I love it.  But let's take stock here:  Bella has been dry humping Edward for almost two years now, and has spent the better part of the last month trying to coax Edward into deflowering her.  She makes a deal that she will marry Edward, even though she is totally against marriage, if he will just do it with her once, even though he has explained that he will most likely kill her during intercourse.  Then enter one really inexplicably cold June night in Forks, and enter Jacob with his 108 degree body whose wolf senses CLEARLY smell a girl in heat.  Suddenly it is ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY to Bella's survival that Jacob wrap his shirtless body around her in her sleeping bag, in front of Edward.  And the entire time, Jacob is fantasizing about bangin' Bella, knowing Edward is reading his mind.

Can you say SADISM?!

Then BANG, the storm is over, Bella can run around without a coat on, and run after Jacob to dry-hump him in front of Edward, and let the wolf stick his tongue down her throat.  Even though Edward is her one true love.  And she's already agreed to marry him.  Then Jacob gets half the bones in his body broken, and after Carlisle painfully rebreaks and resets his bones, Bella walks in to weep and say that she really does love Edward more, but thanks for the smooch.  That's cold, Bella.  Stone ass cold.

I actually didn't like Bella much at the end of Eclipse, the book.  I thought she was a tease and not so naive that she didn't know she was playing both of these guys, particularly Jacob.  And I got a little fed up with the whole "UGH, do I HAVE to marry you Edward?" because who gives a crap if you are marrying him if you are becoming undead soon afterward anyway?  Yes, Bella, you HAVE to marry the superhot sparkly vampire who has pledged his life to you and promised you wedding night nookie even though you will inevitably be cock-blocking him, AGAIN.  And HELLO, can you imagine the haul from the gift registry?   "We'll need 14 Nambe bowls to hold all of the blood at parties, and four sterling candleabras, and some of those lovely Waterford goblets.  For the blood."

Let me take a moment to assure you, gentle reader, that I know these things to be true:

• these are books
• vampires and werewolves are not real
• Bella is a teenager and doesn't know shit
• no one puts blood in Nambe bowls

But still.  I can't have Oldest Daughter sitting there watching the movie thinking, "Damn girl, I need to get me two hot boyfriends and play them off of each other!"  I don't even want her to get ONE hot boyfriend.  I'd like her to be BFF's with a guy on the Lego Robotics team and Computer Club, and they can Facebook each other until they are 23, disease-free, and able to get a nice job with benefits.  But I digress.

Bella?  I know Stephenie had to drag this story out for four books, and there needed to be a conflict.  But it all ended up making you look kind of pathetic and cruel and fairly whorish for a virgin (another favorite scene with Bella and Charlie and "the talk").  And I know there is more coming (no pun intended) in Breaking Dawn, but at least we FINALLY get to see you two nutty kids get past the tentative smooching and groaning stage, because I'm starting to avert my eyes when you kiss.  It's all so pent-up-frustration-y.  As they say in boxing, "LET'S GET IT ON!"

Happy Whoreticulture Friday, and have a terrific weekend!  And go see Eclipse, it's the best one yet!

A Love Story

Whenever I'm alone with you
You make me feel like I am home again
Whenever I'm alone with you
You make me feel like I am whole again.
However far away, I will always love you.
-Robert Smith, The Cure

I am back from Scottsdale and a long weekend with my girlfriends to celebrate Club 40, and truly, I am almost at a loss for words. (And we all know how rare that is!) How do you describe what it's like to be with people who have known you for nearly 3/4 of your life? In front of whom you will go to the bathroom? Or change your clothes? Or prance around in a bikini? (Knock it off, CH, it's not Whoreticulture Friday yet!) Women who have seen you through:

• Bad boyfriends (we did determine that I didn't have boyfriends so much as guys I stalked)
• Bad haircuts (I give you the 'Flock of Seagulls' shave from 8th grade)
• Bad fashion (knickers, OP shorts, full Dallas housewife rhinestone jewelry)
• Bad decisions ("...but his girlfriend is away at college!" OR "He may live in a trailer with his mother and have mental problems, but he should be okay to buy us beer at night, right?")

Lucky me! I have six of those people! It's like I won the friendship lottery! Except that it isn't like that at all. It's more like being married, or having children. It's damn hard work, and when you stick it out and put your heart into it, it turns into this lifetime commitment of knowing when someone has your back.

My friendship with these women has been much like having my kids. When it's fresh and new, you're unsure of what to do or whom that other person will turn out to be. You're a little awkward. You make mistakes. You hold their head when they are throwing up and you hold their hand when they are sad. You kiss their boo-boos. You get angry when a boyfriend treats them badly. You get mad at their bad choices. You call them on their BS, and then you forgive. You cry at their weddings and births, and then you cry at their breakups and bad luck. You listen. You try to make it all better. In return you get hugs and love in spades. And you think they are the most beautiful, talented, smartest people you've ever known, and by some miracle, they think the same of you.

It's magical. It's rainbows and ponies and falling stars. And then it's awkward, because you go home and you tell your Current Husband (CH - that one is for you, Jen) about some of your conversations, and he becomes alarmed.

ME: "So then I was telling them about how often we have sex, and..."
CH: "You talked about that?"
ME: "Of course! So then I was talking about that position..."
CH: "You talked about specific POSITIONS!?!"
ME: "Duh! You can't talk about sex without talking about positions! And a couple of us had these hilarious stories about dogs in the room during sex..."
CH: "I can't hear any more. I'll never be able to see any of them again."
ME: "Listen CH, you'd better just understand that they know EVERYTHING. But I, too, know everything about them. So it's like a balance of power. They'll never use it against you."
CH: "That's not really the point, Julie. Isn't that between us? Is nothing sacred?"
ME: "It's all sacred, and it's between us and these six other women. And probably their husbands too, because they will probably report it to their spouses like I am with you. And their co-workers and friends, because the husbands will probably tell some of the juicier stories at work. But we'll never meet those people, so don't worry."
CH: "You aren't leaving the house anymore."

So thanks for the mammaries, girls. And know that you make me feel like I am young again. And however far away, I will always love you.
(See? This blog wasn't as bad as you thought it would be. Stay tuned for the next blog, all about breasts, skin tag removal, 350-pound guys in Mexican restaurants, and Heather Cox from ESPN, who is tall and lovely.)