Well, hello there! I'm ... well, I'm feeling rather nervous, if you can believe it, because this group is a strange group with only a few familiar faces, and I am NAKED, just naked right now and I'm totally going to take advantage of it. (Also, that line makes me think of Jennifer Love Hewitt and her one Top 40 hit "Barenaked" which I am embarrassed to admit that I sort of liked ... aaand also, I like Jennifer Love Hewitt quite a bit, despite the fact that people call her "Love" (GAG) and this definitely includes The Ghost Whisperer, where I am riveted by her spider-leg eyelashes and massive boobs. Do you hate me yet?)
I'm Jonna, by the way -- of Jonniker, if you didn't know, and why would you? -- and Jennie asked me to post in her stead while she's away on business. To be honest, this is something I've never done before, mostly because I'm a pansy and don't want to ruin someone else's blog. And worse, I am a REALLY awful blogger to write something in one contained post, because I tend to go all over the place (see: Jennifer Love Hewitt and her MEZMERIZING BOOBS).
So ha ha! Why should this be any different? For the briefest of backgrounds, I'm a 32-year-old freelance writer married to the delightful Adam, and have recently relocated to Vermont from Florida, although Boston is my home, mostly. Oh, and I've been trying to have a baby for like, a really long time, and last time I checked, I didn't have one, or even the beginnings of one. I am not convinced any of this will be relevant to the post at hand, because -- per usual -- I have NO IDEA where I'm headed with this.
Can we talk for one second about infertility-lite, which is sort of what I have, for the moment (let's leave medical specifics out of this, shall we? Because I won't be able to do it well). While some people get up in arms when people ask if they're trying, or when they're going to start having kids, I am bothered by the fact that people tiptoe around us like we're broken. No one asks about it because they're afraid I'm a petite little flower who's going to blow up and begin weeping uncontrollably in their face. And you know, that's kind of insulting -- for starters, anyone who knows me realizes that's not particularly likely, and secondly, by avoiding it, it becomes this HUGE PINK ELEPHANT in the room. And the fact that it's become an elephant, not the situation at hand, is what makes me want to cry.
Nowhere, by the way, is this elephant more obvious than when my stepmother spends twenty minutes updating me on my brother's two little boys, then pausing for like A REALLY LONG TIME before blindly asking, "So, ah, how's Sunny? We really need to get a picture of her for the grandkid wall!"
Sunny is my dog. And while yes, she's my baby right now, she is not, in fact, an actual baby, and I know my stepmom is just trying to relate, and yes yes, I do love her for it, but I wish she would JUST ASK ME ABOUT THE ELEPHANT, you know? I'd feel better than trying to pretend that my dog is equal to her grandchildren. Because while for some people, it might be, because of my elephant, it isn't, you know? So I just end up feeling sort of empty and stupid.
So I guess I'm saying, if one of your friends has an elephant, maybe think about whether she'd like you to ask about the elephant. At the least, I'm sure she'd say she'd rather you not IGNORE the elephant and talk about a dog instead. I mean, at least I would.
Ahem. It feels good to say that. Also, I found out this morning that I am not pregnant, and I'm telling you, I really thought I was. Aand, my parents arrive today. Am looking forward to elephant talk.
So, ah, here's a totally unrelated question in the world's most awkward segue: You know those dances, like the Lawnmower, The Hammer Dance, etc? Seeing as I apparently MISSED the 1980s watching too many Golden Girls episodes and sitting with my nose in a Roald Dahl book (oh, The Witches!), I ... well, I'm having a hard time believing that anyone actually DID those dances back then, although once, at a fraternity formal in college, some dude busted out with the running man in utter sincerity and nope, we never went out again. Does this make me shallow? Probably. But I'm telling you, I couldn't marry someone who did the running man without the SLIGHTEST TOUCH of irony, and it was time to just ... well, get out while I could, I suppose, before a lifetime of running man's flashed before my eyes.
(And let's forget that once, I fell in love with a guy I saw breakdance at a bar in college. I am an onion of many incongruous layers. That guy, by the way, is now a pastor at a southern super-church and is married to a bottle blonde wife with acrylic nails and huge, barrel-curled bangs. And let's just say that's not a lifestyle I ever dreamed of, which means that I TOTALLY should have stuck with my dancing instincts on that one. A narrow miss, I tell you, A NARROW MISS.)
(My husband is not a dancer. No surprise there.)
Oddly, this is in conflict with my general feelings on dancing, which are that if you're going to dance, you have to go WHOLE HOG. You can't be tentative, you can't be a pansy. You just ... well, you just have to go for it, because nothing is worse than a dancer who's just awkwardly going through the motions, you know? It's like you can just SEE that they are in agony, which puts the witness in agony which ... well this, my friends, is why I don't dance. The genesis for this topic is because at the moment I wrote this last night, my husband was inexplicably watching quirky wedding dances (mostly based off of the Evolution of Dance, which surely you've seen, yes?) on YouTube while an NBA playoff game languished on pause. I don't get it, either, and I'm SO FIRED as a wife if he finds out I told you that. So don't tell anyone, okay?
And finally, because frankly, I've likely bored you to tears and lost Jennie as a friend at this point, I'll leave with a product recommendation. Now, I don't know about you, but I'm a picker -- gross as this is, I CANNOT let a whitehead just lay there, which often means that I'm either making zits worse, or creating one from nothing more than a tiny clogged pore. Either way, the result is an unpleasantly polka-dotted face. Non-pickers do not understand this, but I'm sorry, I CANNOT UNDERSTAND YOU EITHER. Also, if you have a whitehead, I am likely spending the bulk of our conversation wondering how I can politely ask you if I can take care of that for you. Which makes me gross. So utterly gross, I know, but I CANNOT LOOK AT THEM WITHOUT THE URGE.
GAH GAH GAH.
Enter Mario Badescu drying cream. Holly recommended the lotion here, but my preference is for the cream, mostly because my zits tend to be of the underground variety. And this stuff DRAWS THEM OUT, YO. As in, you put it on the night before, and the next morning, yes, yes, you have a zit that may, um, need to be popped (SORRY SORRY SORRY), but if you take care of business (GENTLY), and reapply the drying cream THE NEXT NIGHT AGAIN, you will wake up the next day and it will be very nearly gone. Poof! LIKE MAGIC. A word of warning, however: Unless you are the color of lemon curd, this cream is NOT skin tone and will not conceal in the slightest. Use at night, dude, when no one can see you and your lemony zits.
And now that I've grossed you all out, I think maybe I should wrap this up. Thanks for listening and thanks to Jennie for having me.
Have an awesome Thursday, Friday and beyond if I don't talk to you again you know, like ever!