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25 June 2010
TRUE CONFESSIONS→[More:]
1. I hate hummus. And chili. And a lot of other stuff most people in my demographic seem to like.
2. I had no idea who Janelle Monae or Neko Case were without googling them.
3. Last time I cleaned out my refrigerator there was moldy pasta. Pasta! With no sauce! Blech.
1. I hate Trader Joes. I think the food they sell is atrocious.
2. I hate Whole Foods too. Their food is great, but the prices and smugness of their clientele makes me crazy..
3. I have no idea who lots of people are, especially musicians and actors who are younger than 30. Thanks God for the internet!
4. Last time I cleaned out my refrigerator I couldn't tell what some of the goop in the nice green bags in my refrigerator used to be. And I lazily threw out my reusable green bags instead of washing them of goop.
5. I still read trash fiction for fun.
1. I still crave candy like I did when I was a little kid. I am 34.
2. I tend to obsess over efficiency. To the point that I get snippy with my husband if he gets out the wrong door in the subway car, thus increasing our commute time by 3 seconds.
3. I never get angry. I rarely feel angry. Occasionally I get paranoid that I have somehow repressed all my anger without realising it, and it's all going to explode in a (candy-fueled) rage sometime in 2019.
1. My libido has slowed down. I hate this.
2. After watching a few You Tube clips with daughter, I finally *get* Sleater-Kinney, and love them. A few years late.
3. I steal towels from my gym for various household uses mostly involving the dog.
4. Dead stuff in the fridge. . .I always toss the containers rather then recycle.
5. I saw Neko Case and was not that impressed.
6. I use some chemicals in the yard (very few) and hide this fact from my wife.
7. I really do not want to be the one to finally piss gaspode off!
4. I've never seen Harry Potter, Doctor Who, The Wire, Dexter, Breaking Bad, and lots of other stuff I'm supposed to like.
5. Similarly, I've never read David Foster Wallace and I hate David Sedaris.
6. I have this strange obsession with my husband's pillowcase. When he wakes up it's half off the pillow and I have to fix it. WHY CAN'T HE KEEP IT ON ALL THE WAY?
1. I used miracle gro garden soil in my formerly all organic vegetable garden this year. I'm going to hippie hell but my GOD the garden is flourishing.
2. I should be spending eight hours a day either looking for a job or writing my book (which so far is, like, 3 pages long) or starting a business or cleaning up the house or doing all kinds of worthwhile shit but instead I mostly just sit around and surf the internet. I suck.
3. Basically, I never bathe my dogs.
4. I have saved up all my extra weight watchers points for alcohol.
5. I am secretly pleased that a weed infested gully separates me from my perfect yuppie princess neighbor with the perfect pristine corporate looking lawn of horror. I suspect that this gully belongs to me yet I intend to keep it weed choked, defending it if necessary on the basis that they are native plants but really it's just full of blackberries and poison ivy and pokeweed and I'm only doing it to be evil. Also I'm lazy, see above.
2. I tend to obsess over efficiency. To the point that I get snippy with my husband if he gets out the wrong door in the subway car, thus increasing our commute time by 3 seconds.
Me too! Well, not the part about getting snippy with your husband. But I can't stand when I'm not the one in the car who's driving because I know we would get there faster if I could just do my super-efficient, time-saving, probably-dangerous weaving and finagling through traffic.
3. I steal towels from my gym for various household uses mostly involving the dog.
Heh. That made me chuckle. I kind of love it.
1. While cleaning out my car, I found an old tortilla in a wrapper underneath the passenger seat that was harder than concrete and moldy. I still have no idea where it came from or how long it had been there.
2. I also filled an entire plastic grocery bag with various other detritus, mostly receipts, used napkins and empty cigarette boxes.
3. I smoke way too much.
4. I get butthurt when people cancel plans on me, even when they have perfectly valid reasons.
1. I just drank a bottle of Colt 45. With Billy Dee's picture on it.
2. I despise Lady Gaga, Whole Foods, and a whole lotta shit my 'demo' seems to love.
3. I love Smokey & the Bandit.
1. Even though all indications would be that I should LOVE Seattle, I am really not fond of it at all. My sister in law lives there and always wants us to visit, but the few times I've been there, my reaction has been rather meh.
2. I have a hard time throwing Christmas/birthday/thank you cards away.
3. I harbor major prejudices against Argentina, although I have never met an Argentine I didn't like. Well, one maybe, but he cheated on my friend, so he was a motherfucker whether he was Argentine or not. Prolly cuz he was Argentine, though.
4. I secretly fear that people are mad at me, even when there would be no reason for them to be cross with me.
5. I finally admitted to myself recently that I really don't like going to see bands play live. I don't like standing up, or other people, or the volume level.
1) I often wouldn't post in a thread like this because I feel my confessions aren't good enough, or, more accurately, wouldn't interest anyone else.
2) I have a lot to say about the Errol Morris thread further down but don't feel like putting in the effort to put it all into words.
3) This thread is the first time I have ever seen the name Janelle Monae and I remember having seen the name Neko Case before, probably on the blue, but didn't care enough to investigate further.
4) I often will eat, or cook with, items found in the fridge that others would consider gross or poisonous. (I do not reveal this fact to my eating companions.)
1. I've been thinking a lot about becoming a parent, via birth or adoption, in the somewhat distant future. But then some days I'm like, eff all that hard work, all I want from life is a nap. Today is one of those days.
2. I love going to the theater; I even enjoy sitting through something bad because even a bad show has good moments.
3. I'm cheap in some ways ("Buy $7 pens? Nah, I'll buy the $2 ones instead", "$20 entree? I'll get the $15 instead") and not in other ways ("An extra $100 a night for the hotel room? I'll take it!"). I'd like to think this selective thriftiness is keeping me in the black.
2. I only wash my hands after the bathroom about half the time, only when it seems necessary, and then never with soap. I think hand sanitizers are ridiculous and the marketing people who need to justify their existence are only making our society more paranoid than it already is.
3. Last night, I had half a bag of SmartFood for dinner.
4. Today's my birthday. Please do not derail this thread, start a different one if you must
5. I grew up in the hippie liberal academic capital of the world, and sometimes I secretly wish I could move to Texas or South Dakota and live as a redneck, learn to shoot a gun, weary nice country boots and skirts, and live in a small town where the highlight of the week is someone's Tupperware party. Here, when someone informs me they're going to Israel or China to discuss foreign policy or race relations, I want to shout, what the heck does that even mean?
1. I am having major cold feet about the whole becoming a single mother thing. I'm still going to do it though.
2. After almost any social interaction, I will obsess about all of the ways I am sure that I acted like an idiot.
3. I have been told many times that I can be intimidating. I find this funny because I am on of the most insecure people you will ever meet. I am not sure what I do to give people the impression that I'm scary.
1. I have been taking cabs to work more often than not in the past few months. Mostly because I'm always running late, but also because it's so much nicer than taking the bus. I hide this from the BF so he doesn't get mad about me wasting money.
2. I love Whole Foods, but only shop there when they have something I can't find at the normal supermarket. I need white truffle oil, damnit!
3. I don't spend enough time hanging out with my hedgehog and I feel bad about it.
4. They took some of my responsibilities away at work and gave them to someone else. I secretly hope this girl has a nervous breakdown or fails miserably so I can do the work again.
1. I have a tooth rotting out of my head. I can't afford the oral surgery, but I'm painfully aware that the longer I wait the more it will cost. Also: ow.
2. I'm terrified that I'll fuck up my life irrevocably, or worse, that I already have fucked up irrevocably and just don't know it yet. It's kind of amazing I ever get anything done.
2a. I do not, in fact, get much of anything done, except for housework, family care, and frivolous writing.
3. I really enjoy my domestic life, and simultaneously feel deeply guilty and conflicted about embracing an approved female role so wholeheartedly. I know that feminism is all about choices, but I often wonder how much of this "conscious choice" is actually me acting out an internalized social role.
1. Many years ago, I went to a bank to break some $100 bills. I realized immediately that the teller, a trainee according to his name tag, had given me $100 too much. I pocketed it and left.
2. In college, my apartment complex played muzak in the hallways between 10 am and 4 pm. I hated it. One night at 3am, I went through all three buildings and uninstalled every speaker and threw them in the neighboring complex's dumpster.
3. Some time after both these incidents, I took a lie detector test to get my government security clearance. I put a tack in my shoe on which I would press my foot whenever I told the truth. When they asked about situations like the above, I would lift my foot off the tack and lie. I passed the test.
1. I deleted my first two true confessions because they are too personal (but it was good to type them out.)
2. I don't read enough anymore. I'd rather play on the Internet, much to my shame.
4. I pass gas in public. I think it's ridiculous to hold it in. Still, I try to do it quietly so people don't notice.
5. I really do find British accents sexy, even though I pretend I am nonplussed.
6. I have erotic dreams featuring Anthony Bourdain.
1. I have never had a job that I really enjoyed. Never. Ever. I have no idea what that is like, and I envy people who actually enjoy what they do.
2. I frequently go to bed at dawn and get up in the afternoon.
3. I sometimes feel that if I am very very quiet perhaps the world will go away and just leave me alone.
4. I constantly sing stupid little narrative ditties to my cat. "Kitteh's jumpin' on the table, I will pet him if I'm able...", etc.
5. I think of myself as a writer though I never really write a goddamn thing.
6. I am firmly convinced that it will all end in tears (for all values of "it") so I'm just going through the motions waiting for the inevitable other shoe.
7. I could eat baby green lima beans every single day of my life and never get tired of them.
8. I like living in a conservative area because I tend to define myself against things rather than for them and if I lived somewhere more liberal I'm afraid I would turn into a rightwing wingnut.
9. I have no plans for the future. I have always made it up as I went along.
10. My toenails are hideous.
1. I don't like Neko either, but apparently she's the standard-bearer for early-30s post-hipsterism. I am square, square, square.
2. Speaking of the word "neko": I really, really don't get what's up with anime.
3. You know what else I really don't get, despite probably being very good at it (having written joking stories about people I know)? Fanfiction. I mean, yeah, I could see wanting Mal and Jayne to get in an oiled-up wrestling match or something, but Picard/Draco mpreg slash? A-WHAT-WHAT???
4. I think I did a grand total of like 2 hours of work this week. Shh.
5. Every time I think I'm going to make a list of all of the books I'm reading, I get derailed because I know I'll have to cop to the terrible romance novels.
6. I especially have a thing for ones with tortured wounded heroes. OH GOD my coursework in critical literary theory and journalism is just ebbing away with every purple phrase.
I like living in a conservative area because I tend to define myself against things rather than for them and if I lived somewhere more liberal I'm afraid I would turn into a rightwing wingnut.
I am generally an opponent of air conditioning. It uses a ton of energy, isolates people in their homes, and cuts down on the neighborhood interaction that we used to have in days of old when people would take walks, porch sit, or set up a sprinkler to cool off. In general I enjoy the opportunity to experience the seasons, and fresh air and open windows are one of summer's greatest gifts.
HOWEVER, after two decades of adult life in which I never once had any interest in AC-ing my house, I have succumbed to installing a window unit in our bedroom. The unit was in the house when we moved in. I assumed it was defunct at first and planned to take it to the dump. But our fourth consecutive day of high-80s temps and humidity with no appreciable cooling at night, combined with the realities of our new apartment with its third-floor dormer bedroom and windows only along one side, drove me to eye the machine with interest.
Two friends visited last night and happily installed it, which is good since I have no idea how to do that without dropping it three stories on the ground. Rationalization: it's only one unit, we'll only use it at night, and we are getting old and really need our sleep. Please, New Urbanists, do not reject me!
1. When I was a kid, I almost shoplifted a bracelet that had fallen out of it's holder on one of those sales tables. I chickened out when I realized that I was being watched, and ditched it. I never, ever even thought about it again.
2. I have never seen "Casablanca", "Gone With the Wind", "Dr. Zhivago" or most of those classic movies. They are on my to-do list, but pretty far down on it.
3. I don't mind not liking other people, but dammit, I want EVERYONE to like me.
1. While cleaning out my car, I found an old tortilla in a wrapper underneath the passenger seat that was harder than concrete and moldy. I still have no idea where it came from or how long it had been there.
1. I love David Sedaris.
2. I like to watch makeup artists on YouTube, like this woman.
3. I do not know who Janelle Monae is.
4. The first thing I do after work is change into yoga pants.
5. Lately I've been watching very boring videos about stormwater runoff and native planting in Florida.
6. I can't articulate well. I am at peace with it. I don't think I'm stupid. I can comprehend, I just can't speak, or type, as well as I'd like.
7. I eat a lot of cereal. I also smear peanut butter on bananas and eat about two a day.
8. The ambulance and the fire truck were at my elderly neighbors this afternoon and I did not go out to investigate. I did not give a damn, and I didn't want to be nosy. I noticed that the ambulance didn't scoop and run and assumed everything was okay.
9. I have a low noise tolerance.
10. I cannot do two things at once.
11. I have a terrible memory. Sometimes I think I'm losing it.
I only wash my hands after the bathroom about half the time, only when it seems necessary, and then never with soap. I think hand sanitizers are ridiculous and the marketing people who need to justify their existence are only making our society more paranoid than it already is.
I pretty much never wash my hands. Really the only time is if someone is watching who I know. Those stupid hand sanitisers will be the downfall of the human race one day. Germs (up to a point) are good for us, in that they build our defence. When we get overrun by some infection that we have no resistance to, I'll be the one yelling out 'I told you so, you fuckwits!'
I've been smoking at work for several months now and hiding it from my partner because it would make her angry. If she finds out, she'll be way more angry that I hid it. I'm a fuckwit.
I can never remember people's names. I recognise them and know who they are, but have no idea what their name is. I'm a fuckwit.
1) My girlfriend's sister is the kind of woman who would have torn my heart into pieces 15 years ago. There's no danger of an AskMetafilter-type situation, but it's something that blips on the radar now and then.
2) I worry I'm not the only one who sees #1.
3) People who can't roll with absurd humor seem alien to me.
4) I resent anyone who is better than I am at anything. So because everyone is better than I am at something, I resent everyone. Including you.
5) I totally cheated on the research project for my biology class in high school. I never did any of it. The growth rates of those imaginary bean sprouts were complete fucking fabrications.
When I am tired of being an adult, I eat candy for breakfast, lunch, and maybe dinner. And then because when I'm not eating candy I eat mostly vegetables, lean protein, and whole grains, I sometimes can't resist answering "help me eat better" AskMes.
Ayn Rand was one of my favorite authors in college. I had fallen in love with science and engineering by then and enjoyed her adoring portrayal of people who could build and design machines and buildings. Most people I knew told me that engineering was boring and uncreative; she seemed to understand that that wasn't true. Yes, I did pick up her fairly abhorrent philosophy for a bit, but I dropped it as I got older and think it did me no lasting damage. I suppose if I re-read them now I'd find her books laughable and despicable. But, my memories of them are fond.
1. I stopped listening to the radio sometime in the 90's. I have no idea who's new or not these days. I depend on others to find new music for me. Whenever stuff is playing for the college kids I start turning into my mother: "what kind of dreck is this? This isn't MUSIC!"
2. I've decided that Younger Boy has won the food battle. If I have to buy stock in Yoplait to get him enough strawberry yogurt the rest of his childhood I'll do it. I'll sneak in vitamins and protein and other good stuff into the food and just wait it out. Hubby doesn't know this yet.
3. Behind on my property taxes and it scares me to death.
4. I live in a conservative area and it drives me insane. But I'd be just as contrarian in a liberal enclave.
5. I've got a prayer written on my shawl ministries bag from church. Now I'm thinking I can't take it with me to visit my atheist parents. I'm currently making a shawl for my mother, and we'll probably bless it. Don't think I'll tell her that.
I wish that people would put stuff thats more personal in here actually! This goes into my #1 that I think most people are alienated and dishonest and I hate most of them.
I wish that people would put stuff thats more personal in here actually!
But it's hard to gauge how personal, how private, how deeply confessional someone else's confessions may feel. I can tell you that after I hit post, I felt an odd lifting sensation: a release of some real shame, and simple relief that I had articulated some deeply worrying thoughts where others could see them.
When I read this thread, I see some people showing amazing honesty --- not just with others on MetaChat, but with themselves. There are some confessions here that can't have been easy to articulate, that must be hard to consider flatly in words as they are here. I find it inspiring.
1. as a student I was a member of a fraternity going back to 1636.
2. somehow I find it hard to fix my house. Hire contractors etc. Which is strange since I would benefit from doing so very much.
3. I used to be an intellectual and a snob about high art literature (Musil, Joyce, Proust, etc).
4. I love, love, love music but dislike most indie music.
5. I hardly ever feel a real connection with people I meet and work with. Mostly I feel I'm faking that I'm just like them and that they wouldn't understand the things I really care about. It's a lonely feeling.
photo by splunge
photo by TheophileEscargot
photo by Kronos_to_Earth
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