Everywhere I’m not gonna be

I moved to Northern Indiana from Chicago just under a year ago. I grew up amongst the cornfields, highways and other incredibly interesting scenery of Elkhart, Ind., and now I’ve returned to work for a community newspaper. After four years of undergrad in one of the biggest cities in the world, I am back to living amongst hillbillies with bad oral hygiene.

The working world is so different from college. For instance, if depression or a hangover keeps you from missing a few classes of Ancient Greek Mythology, who cares? You can sit in your slummy apartment, slurp lo mein all day long and still come out of the the course with a decent grade. Here, the newsroom doesn’t care if you need therapy or hate your job or have had a bad day … you must produce, or you will lose your job.

We’re made to feel guilty for taking our sick days and vacation, which really gets to me.
There is always someone walking up to us and telling us all the little things we’ve done wrong.
Health benefits are getting worse and more expensive.
And here, we’re barely supplied with the kind of supplies we need to do our jobs.

It really gets to me, this harsh reality of what it means to be a working adult. Is it just because I’m on the bottom of the totem pole, or will it be this way forever? It’s not fun living paycheck to paycheck and working long hours for no extra money (at this point, I would just settle for a pat on the back).

How easy is it to freelance and get jobs as a free agent? I’ve had about all I can take of cubicles and gray walls. I’m sick of not being everywhere I thought I’d be. I’m sick of not seeing any clear ways to get to those places, either, and it scares the shit out of me.

A very bad one-night stand

Let me tell you one little thing I’ve learned about one-night stands: If you want one bad enough — and you don’t have three eyes or a cleft lip — you can make it happen. I consider them some form of recreational drug I can’t say I take often, or even seldom, but when I do, it just feels groping around in a college dorm room all over again.

Guys in bars pretty much go to said bars to graze, horny beasts in white striped shirts that smell of Burberry or Sean John. And, oops, girls in bars are probably there to play the boyfriend game. It’s almost a cruel trick of nature: Thanks to loose morals, text messaging and a total lack of social navigation skills in this new world, we’re all in the same place wanting different things out of the night. I’m not saying all girls want to find a boyfriend when they go out, but I really rarely hear one of my friends say, ‘I just want to find a piece of ass.’ And they’re pretty slutty.

As a girl who is somewhere in between a boyfriend hunter and an ethical slut, I like to be in my ’sweet spot’ when out drinking. I like to be witty, charming and cute … hopefully just a mildly more confident version of the person I am while sober. I do not like to be bombed, drunk dialing my parents and dropping my cell phone in the toilet … it just doesn’t send out a ‘take me home to Mom!!!!’ vibe.

But that’s what usually happens. And that’s when the trouble begins.

I end up in strip clubs or in the lairs of 30-year-old men with aquariums in their living rooms. I end up spilling into cabs with my friends, accompanied by strangers whose names we repeat over and over in order not to call them something ridiculously off the mark. I end up around drugs and bad people, strippers and cheating husbands. The world of drunks is marked by one sick culture, but it’s a very happening social calendar.

The last one night stand I hopefully ever have saw me being horribly, horribly cruel. If the worse thing you can do to a man is damage his pride while he’s trying to seduce you, well, I gutted him from nose to navel:

Me: Okay! I’m bored
Strange Ass: What?!
Me: I’m bored. I don’t want to do this. You’re jackhammering.
Strange Ass: WHAT?! I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU JUST SAID THAT!
Me: I’m sorry. What was I supposed to do? Just lie there?
Strange Ass: Oh … well, I guess you have a point. At least you spoke up …
Me: Yup. Sorry. Night!

The gods are merciful. When I woke up, my conquest was long gone.

What I’m trying to say is that over the years, the drinking culture has somewhat impossibly shot my standards up. It’s just that feeling of having done this all before, and when you can take sex with people you don’t like or respect at face value, it’s pretty much worth nothing at all.

But don’t get me wrong. I don’t feel one way or the other when I hear about my friends notching up their bedposts, because I know once upon a time that was me. And who says, one night, it won’t still be me? Eh, passing judgment in these situations is silly. What bothers me, I guess, is the seemingly universal feeling that girls shouldn’t do what a lot of us do all the time, i.e. get it on with no strings attached.

And if I do end up, again, in a situation where I hook up with someone I don’t know that well or respect (and I probably will), whatever. They only have to last one night.

The dissection of Miley Cyrus

(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

Well, the inevitable has happened: 15-year-old Miley Cyrus has found herself in the middle of a heated debate over her budding sexuality. Apparently a “Vanity Fair” shoot with THE premier celebrity photographer Annie Lebowitz ended up with a nude Cyrus — save for the white satin sheet wrapped around her torso and the cherry lip stain on her pout.

Cyrus released this statement in apology:
“I took part in a photo shoot that was supposed to be ‘artistic’ and now, seeing the photographs and reading the story, I feel so embarrassed,” Cyrus said. “I never intended for any of this to happen and I apologize to my fans who I care so deeply about.”

And “Vanity Fair” stands by Lebowitz, saying the Disney star’s “minders” were pleased with the “artistic” photos during the shoot.

This so-called scandal is pretty racy for a girl not old enough to drive. But this young girl also happens to be raking in a reported $1 billion for Disney by the end of the year, so it’s not surprising the media is all over this story — or non-story, depending on how sick you are of hearing about it — in attempts to figure out who to blame. Is it her dad, Billy Ray Cyrus, for allowing his daughter to skyrocket to a dizzying degree of worldwide success in such a short time? Is it Miley herself, for forgetting some of her fans are stuffing “Hannah Montana” knapsacks and lunch boxes into their kindergarten cubby holes? Is it Lebowitz, for being the shutterbug who should’ve known better?

Or, well, is it us? For Googling, blogging and speculating about what the rules are for people with whom we have no personal connection? It’s hard enough being a teenager, and even though it’s sort of difficult to scrape up sympathy for someone who makes more money in a year than I will ever see in my lifetime, she is still just a kid.

And hey, look at what happened to kid stars like Lindsay Lohan and Britney Spears … apparently no one’s yet figured out how to raise a child in the spotlight. And what’s worse, those two were chewed up and spit out by a culture (US) that cared only just enough to chew on them. If “racy” photos didn’t whip us into a frenzy and cause us to buy more copies of “Vanity Fair,” maybe this whole thing wouldn’t be a scandal in the first place. Maybe we’d see it for the marketing ploy it is, whether it comes from “VF’s” camp or the Cyrus’.

Why not let her be a kid — and she is a kid — and make it a point not to completely turn on her if she slips up? It’s a novel idea.

Coldplay giving away song!

Coldplay is going the route of other culturally-savvy bands (Radiohead, for one) and offering a free download of the song “Violet 4:11″ from their upcoming CD, “Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends.” Download time begins from the Coldplay site at 12:15 p.m. Londontown time … which means 7:15 a.m. for us Eastern-timers. The single will be available for one week, and “Viva” drops June 12.

I can’t wait.

A girl walks into a bar.

About five years ago, I got my first fake ID. I was 18 and it was three days after starting college in Chicago. I paid 50 bucks to this random stranger in another dorm, and he made me and three friends absolutely atrocious Michigan IDs on his bubble-jet printer. The lamination peeled up around the edges and the ink was so faded you could barely make out the features on our faces.

But here’s the thing: they worked everywhere we tried to use them. Chalk it up to being a girl, with girl friends, walking into a bar.

So since then, I’ve been in probably about seven thousand bars. I don’t know what it is about the city of Chicago, but I swear it must be the most boozer-friendly town in our great nation … you can’t trip and fall without landing in an establishment that stays open until 4 a.m. for your drinking convenience. Thanks to this fact, I’ve told insanely personal things to strangers, kissed even more of them and, sadly, woken up in horror next to a select few.

I’ve wondered lots of times what, exactly, the appeal of a bar is. But I suppose it’s pretty obvious: Close up a bunch of frustrated, emotionally-stunted people up in a room, give them cups full of colorful liquid and watch the sparks fly. What’s not to love? I suppose bars let us do and say things we can’t anywhere else — when was the last time you groped a stranger in the supermarket check out line? — and I suppose bars are just things to do when we’re too lazy to try to be interesting. Instead of planning a dinner party or bowling outing, why not get drunk and burn your mouth on frozen pizza at four in the morning, while some strange middle-aged man fashions you a tulip out of a cocktail napkin?

Then comes the concept of the dance floor in the bar. This is universally recognized to be a disaster: Once you’re ready to get up on stage and shake some ass to horrible music, you’ve reached the point of no return. I’m one of those girls who gets out on the dance floor and doesn’t come off until it’s last call and my makeup has smeared down my face. My friends are more the type that like to hang back in the corner and fend off approaching males with mean eyes and bitchy comments.

That’s another interesting thing about bars — if you spend too much time in them, you learn to hate and mistrust the opposite sex. After years of learning that guys will tell you anything you want to get you to sleep with them, I tend to either take them for what they’re worth or ignore the whole lot of them. I have no idea what bars, cell phones and generally sluttier behavior are doing to damage the act of courtship, but I have a feeling all of them combined are a death sentence. What’s the point of even taking a girl out to eat if you can just feed her $2.50 bottles of Miller Lite on dollar beer Tuesdays? What’s the point of dating a guy when he’s exactly the same as the other dude across the room nursing a Jack and Coke?

I don’t have much of a point to make about this. I was just thinking about bars. I think I should stay out of them.

Leggings: Friend or foe?

I was in Britain two years ago when I first noticed women wearing neutral-toned leggings under shapeless tunics or impossibly short miniskirts. When I arrived back stateside in December 2006, the trend was just about to catch on in a big way. I’m going to admit it was amazingly trendy and urban-feeling for awhile, and I distinctly remember asking myself why it took so long for such an obvious accessory to catch on.

But once a fashion trend trickles into the suburbs, the general rule is that it’s probably already out of hand. Leggings went from black to grey to velvet burnout or disco-silver. The dresses covering the leggings got shorter until women were actually just wearing normal-length T-shirts over painted-on leggings (read: Lindsay Lohan).

Now, I’m not saying leggings are as bad as other fashion bandwagons women tend to jump on, like those disgusting, scrunched-up tiny tees that magically fit everyone, but I think leggings should be used in moderation. This is a little list of guidelines I am going to print out and tape to my refrigerator every time I’m tempted to be irresponsible with my leggings collection:

1. Gold leggings may be worn from December – January. Throw plum leggings out because those were obviously a mistake.

2. A camel-toe check must be completed before I exit the house in any questionably-short “dress” or “tunic” that is actually better-described as a “stretched out T-shirt.”

3. Leggings are best with flats.

4. Never wear leggings with flip-flops unless I’m going the county fair.

I have a feeling I’ll ignore rule #4, but let’s remember I’m from Indiana. You can take the girl out of the cornfield, but her love for flip-flops and boys who work in lumber yards will just never fade.

So, leggings: Are they friend or foe?

Which of Ryan Reynolds’ exes has a better CD?

If you’re any sort of gossip fiend, you know that actor Ryan Reynolds was once engaged to Alanis Morissette. He’s not anymore. Now Reynolds is dating starlet Scarlett Johansson. But this blog has nothing to do with Reynolds himself, because he’s actually not interesting and sort of talentless. It’s about his current love and ex-betrothed both releasing studio albums on May 20.

I was just sort of sitting here wondering if it’s any sort of contest. I mean, it’s Alanis Freakin’ Morissette, the girl I thought invented scorned anger the first time I heard “You Oughta Know” in the fifth grade. “Jagged Little Pill” was my first CD, and I remember memorizing breathless lyrics like “Does she go down on you in a theater?” loooong before I knew what the term meant. That song was supposedly about Dave Coulier, for God’s sake! How could a charmed 23-year-old like Scarlett ever compare?

When I first read that Ms. Scarlett is releasing “Anywhere I Lay My Head,” a collection of re-interpreted Tom Waits covers, I couldn’t help but roll my eyes a little bit. OF COURSE A HOLLYWOOD ACTRESS WOULD RELEASE AN ALBUM ALMOST EXCLUSIVELY FULL OF COVERS [only one song is original]!!!! It really drives me nuts that these Hollywood people can spew forth all sorts of merchandise (garbage) left and right just because they feel like it … but oh, well … I feel blessed it’s a CD and not a fashion line.

I just clicked on the “Listening Party” section of Johansson’s website, www.scarlettalbum.com, and gave “Anywhere” 25 minutes of my time. She told Spin’s David Marchese that her producer, Dave Sitek of TV on the Radio, suggested her album sound like a mix of too much cough syrup and Tinkerbell hallucinations.

That’s exactly what happens on this record. Ummm, mission accomplished?

But you know what? It’s not horrible. The track “I Don’t Wanna Grow Up” reminds me of that scene in “Lost in Translation” when Scarlett and Bill Murray are in that karaoke bar. If that song had started pumping through the speakers, it would’ve fit perfectly with those zebra-striped walls, not to mention that ridiculous pink wig. It’s very electro pop look-at-me-I’m-shopping-at-Urban-Outfitters. I dig it.

I also like “I Wish I Was in New Orleans,” even if it sounds like one of those background songs to a Volkswagen commercial where two middle-class people drive into a field to look at stars through the sunroof.

That’s about all I like. I do not enjoy the lead single, “Falling Down,” because I think Scarlett’s voice has too much echo and makes her sound like she’s dying at the bottom of a well somewhere. The song’s only redeeming quality is David Bowie. That man could record himself blowing his nose for three hours and I’d still listen to it.

Which now brings me to Alanis. I love Alanis. I really do. I love her oblong face, her spirally hair and I especially love the fact that she looks like someone who would make an excellent dive bar drinking companion. I bet she’d be totally cool about it if I accidentally spilled half a pint of Guinness on her.

With that being said, I also happen to love Imogen Heap of Frou Frou. Alanis enlisted Guy Sigsworth (who worked with Heap as electro duo Frou Frou) as a writer for her newest disc, “Flavors of Entanglement,” and the result is that zippy, pretty music I enjoy so much. I especially love the song “Moratorium,” because it’s beautiful and because, once again, Alanis lets all of us pissed off females out there know it’s okay to give a middle finger to relationships.

Alanis is counting down to a big tour, and her life is documented on a neat little Flash application on her Web site, www.alanis.com. Seeing photos of her dogs and her friends in places like Amsterdam and Geneva just sort of reinforce the idea I have of her being incredibly down-to-earth and fun to be around. ScarJo, on the other hand? I’d be scared of accidentally stepping on her Manolos and pissing her off.

So, in short, Scarlett’s album doesn’t totally suck. Okay. But Alanis’ albums never suck, and this new disc preserves the old, emotional style of hers we know and love while playing around with a new brand of niceness that’s refreshing after years and years of pissed off copycats.

Duh … Alanis wins. Did you think for a second I’d pick Scarlett?

Levi

I lost a great dog this past weekend. I’m pretty heartbroken about it. I had a childhood dog, Lisa, and now my teenage dog, Levi, is gone. His death says so much, including solidifying the eerie feeling that I’m really not a kid anymore.

He was a simple dog; as long as he had a bed and some human food, he was the sweetest little thing. He was stubborn, yes, but the furthest I ever had to go to get him to come inside was walk out and pick up his little body as he lay basking in the sun.

I hate saying goodbye to the people and animals I love. The permanence of death is the only thing that’s ever really non-negotiable, and I think we’re all inclined to freak out when we realize we don’t have as much control as we thought.

So, Levi’s playing with all of the other dogs and cats and fish and birds and hamsters and mice we as a family have lost along the way. Our grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins will watch over all of them until it’s our turn. I’m not sure I believe in the afterlife, actually, but when things like this happen I can’t help but hope for it, just a little.

Journalism vs. Public Relations

I was eight years old when I discovered the typewriter in my dad’s law office. It wasn’t anything special — just a long, tan rectangle that probably weighed more than I did. I had to press down on the “On/Off” switch so firmly I thought it might break, the first time I sat down to write, and it came alive with a steady hum. No matter how old, how deaf, how crazy I might get, I will always remember the noise that typewriter made, the quick clacking of the keys and the “swish” sound that came when I pressed “Enter” to switch to a new line.

I’m not saying my work was, or is, that great; I pecked out stories about trees who spent days dreaming of the things they wanted to be (one was turned into a canoe, another a book and one stayed a tree … I didn’t realize until now the act of being cut down and ground into a boat or book might be a tree’s worst nightmare, but whatever). I created a girl my age who had the life I wanted: Eyes free of wire-rimmed glasses and attention from boys. She, “Libby,” was going to be my first novel. Yeah, I gave up maybe a year later, after several chapters, when I realized that her life wasn’t interesting even to me. Flaws are good.

 But my point is, over the “brrzzzz” of that IBM typewriter, I came to realize I wanted to be a writer. 

A few years later, in middle school, I crafted my own handmade newsletter, [No Subject], and passed it out to my friends. The local newspaper wrote a feature on me. That’s when I began to set my sights on journalism. I was about 14. 

So for almost a decade, I’ve been pursuing a career in print journalism. And I’ve done everything I said I was going to do. I’ve freelanced for a huge paper, interned across the Atlantic and snagged my first reporting job a week after graduating from college. 

I still love reporting. But I get scared because I know jobs are disappearing and I don’t know where that leaves newbies like me. The pay isn’t great, but you do this because you love it and not because you want a lot of money. And besides, half the time chasing a story feels like anything but work. I love telling stories. I’m still that kid pecking away and trying to make sentences mean something, except now I do it on a MacBook. 

The problem, I guess, is that I miss living in a big city. I’m not sure I want to put in the time it would take to take a stab at a major metro reporting job. I don’t want to settle for some crappy “writer/editor” position with some company I don’t care about — these job postings seem ubiquitous in places like Chicago. 

So what if I sold my soul and went into PR? More money, more perks and probably a little more respect. I don’t know what it would take for my heart to be in it. And, when it comes to that nerdy little girl writing about optimistic trees, I don’t want to completely throw her away. When it comes to the things I really care about, I feel like I’ve already thrown away so much. 

I don’t know what I want to do. 

 

My first experience with “American Idol.”

Last night I made my first foray into the mad, mad world that is “American Idol.” Don’t ask me how it happened. I’m still not sure. I’ve been hearing for years that this show is addictive, and after watching it for one hour I really have to say that there is a certain quality about AI that makes it hard to turn off the television. I can’t say what it is. Maybe it’s the gleam in Ryan Seacrest’s veneers, or the sound of Paula Abdul’s slightly nasally voice as she once again praises a contestant. And maybe it’s the contestants themselves — they’re the only part of the show that seems genuine to me. For the most part, the singers look exhausted to the point of tears, but seem to manage leaping around stage and fielding silly questions from viewers.Seeing Dolly Parton perform was nice, I guess, but her voice was not half as entertaining as that silvery-leggings-attached-to-a-corset-under-see-through-negligee she wore as she strutted around the stage. I’m going to take a wild guess and say that if anyone can not only pull off an outfit so ridiculous, but to have the collective American viewing audience say “Awwww,” it’s Dolly Parton. How an you not find anything she does endearing? So, to sum it all up, I’ll say this: To me, AI has the same “guilty pleasure” vibe going for it as one of those 6,000 calorie KFC bowls: You might be inclined to eat one in the privacy of your own home, but wouldn’t be caught dead digging into it around your friends. Would I watch again? Maybe, but I hope not. I have a feeling AI on a regular basis would be as beneficial to me as secretly eating KFC bowls once a week. Both sound equally creepy.