I Am The Definition of Awkward

My life is very awkward. I am very awkward.

But before I explain further, let me ask you a question. Have you ever watched, seething with jealousy, as some old dude careens down the sidewalk on a motor powered wheelchair? Have you ever fought the urge to shove an old woman off one of those motor scooters are Target, because she's zooming around and not only getting her purchases faster, but also running over small children (without getting in trouble) in the meantime? Have you ever wanted to pick up a child out of a wheelchair and throw them to the curb, then steal it because your legs are tired, and damnit you just want to get home faster?

Well, of course you have. But the point is, once you have to actually get in a wheelchair, you suddenly can't wait to scramble out of it and run away as fast as humanly possible.

The first time I ever had to stick my surprisingly round ass in a wheelchair of any sort (besides after a surgery, or after twisting an ankle and having to be carted from the waiting room into the ER or something) was on a trip to Target. I'd been having a bad day pain wise, and once I got into the store, I realized there was no way in hell I'd be able to walk around for more than, oh, .005 seconds. Erin had to procure a motor scooter for me, which caused quite a few raised eyebrows, as I don't particularly look like I need a motor vehicle for movement purposes.

Of course it didn't help matters much that the only scooter left wasn't charged enough, so I had to inch around in the store, pissing everyone off around me because turtles and slugs and such kept speeding by me. Even the old people looked like marathon runners in comparison. And, to add insult to injury, the goddamn thing beeped like a fucking truck when I backed up. It seemed to shout "fat ass needs you out of the damn way to back up!" with every movement. It was mortifying.

I hadn't had to use a wheelchair in public since then, until this past week. My father and I realized that there was no way in hell I could get around in the airport with one, as it'd been something of a struggle to walk from my bed to my bathroom. We told the Jet Blue staff that I'd just had surgery (a cleaner, less embarrassing way to explain the situation, as people look at you funny when you say "oh hey, an ovarian cyst ruptured all over my pelvis, and I bled all over my abdomen - can you push my fat ass around? Thanks!") and needed a chair, so some poor sap got stuck wheeling me around Dulles.

And, if you didn't know, they just moved the Jet Blue terminal, so I got to take a wild ride on the shuttle, and be pushed even further around. I kept my sunglasses on and hid my face, and my father was protectively hovering around me, so some people got really curious and were trying to see if I was... well, probably not famous, I'd need a bigger entourage, but people were seriously craning their necks and deliberately walking by.

I suppose at least that cheered me up a little. I should've pulled the "Yeah, I'm totally Lindsay Lohan, I'm just not wearing make up - and I forgot to go get a touch up on my tan" card. That might've worked.


Whatever, close enough.

The way back was way more awkward, however, because my dad wasn't flying with me, so I just looked like an oversized bug, dressed all in black with my sunglasses on, huddled in a wheelchair pushed by a large woman who didn't speak any English, all on my own. I think everyone just thought I was a freak.

When I'm in pain and I'm walking, I tend to favor my left leg and put the weight on it, keeping the right leg slightly bent. I think it's because when the first cyst ruptured, it was on my right side, so the pain tends to be worse in that area. On the trip back to DC, everyone asked if I had just had knee surgery (since why else would a seemingly otherwise healthy 22-year-old be in a wheelchair?) so I just said yeah. It really is much easier than launching into my Reproductive Organ Mayhem Speech; say "knee surgery" and no one bats an eye (in fact people are very nice to you) but even start saying "uteru-" and people freak out.

Well, now that I'm back in DC, my adventures with wheeled modes of transportation aren't over. I have another week until I'm supposed to attempt walking to work (which is so strange, because when I'm healthy and fine, 6 or so blocks are nothing - but when I'm in pain, it may as well be an attempt to take a stroll to, oh, North Carolina) so I'm on cab patrol until then. Which means goodbye, $20 a day!

Crap, I knew I should've taken the other taxi

This morning - after sleeping a galling 14 hours last night - I stumbled out of bed and actually showered, dressed myself, and put on makeup. I figured I'd attempt looking human on my first day back to work in almost 2 weeks. I waddled out the front door of my building, and after freezing to the bone in just under 20 seconds (WHY is it so cold in DC?!) I hailed a cab and made my way to work. I paid the $10 freaking dollars (including tip) and was about to get out of the car, when the driver happily said, "Aw, are you pregnant?"

I suppose I should've expected this, as:

1. I took a taxi 6 blocks away.
2. I keep a hand over my stomach protectively in the car, because the uneven pavement/pot holes really freaking hurt
3. I'm puffy and retaining water and I looked slightly manic

But I was horrified. Especially because this isn't the first time I've been asked that question. And I don't just mean by a concerned gynecologist.

When I had surgery in June of '06 I had a laparoscopy, which entails having gas pumped into your stomach so that there's more space between organs, and it's easier for your doctor to get the tiny lasers and scissors in there (as a laparoscopy, for endometriosis at least, involves cutting out and burning away any scar or endometrial tissue that may be causing problems.) Unfortunately, you end up with a ballooned out stomach, which doesn't go away for about a week and a half or so. Which meant that 5 days after surgery, when I was up and mobile and going to summer classes at UMass Boston, I had a giant, pregnant-looking stomach. It didn't help that I always had one hand protectively over it, and the other supporting my aching back. I had the pregnant woman walk down, kids.

Mothers and women of all ages would come up to me, cooing and congratulating me. The only reason I didn't snap necks left and right was because they said my baby would be beautiful, just like me. Goddamn right any spawn of mine would be beautiful.

So, long story... long... I'm almost used to being asked if I'm happily impregnated. That doesn't mean I like it. I snarled something about uteri at the cab driver and dragged my sorry ass out of the cab, and proceeded to angrily waddle up to the front door of my building.

Only to find the building locked. After all, it is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, so EVERY OTHER BUSINESS IN THE DISTRICT HAS THE DAY OFF.

Only 7 more stories to go!

I waited for half an hour in the bitterly freezing cold, all the while leaving multiple messages on my boss' office phone and cell phone. Someone finally came to the lobby door, and informed that that no, none of the offices were open, and I should go home. So I did.

An hour later (after spending a total of $20 on cabs so far), my boss calls. Oh yeah, hey, the office is open, I got delayed, um, come in. AWESOME. So I shell out another $10, cart my ass all the way back to work, and so far I've spent 2.5 hours doing absolutely nothing, other than taking 10 seconds out and booking a rental car.

It's dark, it's cold, and I think we're the only 2 people in the entire building. And our office is in a massive building. This can end in one of several ways:

Scenario 1: My boss turns into a homicidal maniac and chases me around with a chainsaw.
Outcome 1: I die. I can't run, and our doors don't lock.

Scenario 2: Zombies overrun the building, in search of fresh meat.
Outcome 2: I die. I can't run, and though we can look our door from the inside, it's glass. It'll give after one or two good attempts at getting in.

Scenario 3: A ghost appears - perhaps the ghost of someone who was messily murdered on a day much like today, in which no one was supposed to be in the office, so no one found their body for days.
Outcome 3a: I die. I can't run, and the ghost can move through walls and doors.
Outcome 3b: I pull a Ghost Whisperer, and help the ghost avenge their death.
- Outcome 3b(i): The murderer is my boss. I die too.
- Outcome 3b(ii): The murderer is my boss. I bring him to justice.
- Outcome 3b(iii): The murderer is not my boss. We both die.
-Outcome 3b(iv): The murderer is not my boss. We team up as a sleuthing duo, and bring the murderer to justice. We then quit our jobs and travel the country with Ghost Hunters, avenging all the pissed off spirits that died messily, without having their murderers brought to justice.

Short of my boss and I become the next Ghost Hunting Nancy Drew & Co. Team, I think I'm in for a bad day. Once it's finally 6pm, and I've spent another $10 getting home, I'm going to pour myself a big class of Absolut Vanilla, watch some Futurama, and cry myself to sleep. It doesn't get anymore glamorous than that.

The Tale of the Fax Machine

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!!!!

Halloween is finally today! It is the greatest day of the entire year, a day in which people can wear witches hats and orange socks and scarves with dancing ghosts, and only some of the people on the sidewalk give them a wide berth. It is a day of greedily shoving fistfuls of candy down your throat, a day of watching horrifically terrible horror movies that were put together with a couple of red necks and a hand held camera, and a day of drinking yourself into a coma because hey, it's okay, you're not an alcoholic if you're celebrating the day when the dead supposedly walk the earth. You're only an alcoholic if you actually see the dead walking the earth.

Which brings up an interesting question, since I saw Smoking Santa lurking outside the front doors again at 1am and then again at 7:30am this morning. Hm.

But I digress. Before I launch into my daily ramblings, I'd like to launch into an equally as long winded - but scarier, if you can imagine - ghost story. Another true ghost story. Submitted for the approval of the Midnight Society, I call this story...

The Tale of the Fax Machine

Once upon a time, there was a girl named Chelsea, and she was beloved by all in the... uh, kingdom. She had glossy, rich chestnut colored hair, a sprinkling of delicate love kissed freckles across her snow white skin, and perfectly sized, perfectly round, voluptuous, heaving... eyeballs. Nice green color, sometimes hazel if she wore gray, really complimented her skin tone. Yeah, she was good at dressing herself.

So Chelsea was a street savvy girl with hope in her heart and a shockingly above average brain in her head, dedicated to working as hard as she could on various important social issues like "why doesn't online yahtzee want to ever give me four-of-a-kind," and "which Hollywood starlet is in jail today for her 5th DUI." She had no way of knowing that on a cold, crisp autumn day in October, her life would be forever changed by the forces of evil.

It was an ordinary day, photocopying, scanning, drinking 17 Coke Zeros from the office fridge - no blanket of darkness, no foggy mist, no ominous background music to suggest the horrors that awaited her. At the ungodly hour of 9:30am, it happened - the phone rang.

Ring. (dramatic recreation of actual events)

"Hello?"

BEEP. BEEP. GURGLE. FAX SOUNDS. ZZZZZZZ. BEEP.

Chelsea warily hung up the receiver, convinced it was merely children playing a prank. The Halloween spirit was in the air (never mind this started in September) and kids will be kids. Imagine her surprise when, minutes later, the phone rang again.

"Hello?"

But all that answered was the deadly, droning robotic noises of the persistent, murderous fax machine.

Chelsea screamed and hung up the receiver once more, her heart pounding, fear beginning to beat through her veins. Why was a fax machine calling? Was it a self-aware fax machine? Was someone programming the dastardly thing to call? And why was this such a big deal?

This horrifying event happened several times throughout the days, stretching on into weeks, months even, if you can count the end of September through October as technically "months." Chelsea was reaching her breaking point when suddenly, everything changed.

Ring.

No! Chelsea thought in horror, her hand shaking as she reached for the phone. Much to her shock, it wasn't the dastardly fax - but the police.

"Chelsea, we've tracked the calls - they're coming from inside your office!"

Chelsea dropped the receiver in one of those slo-mo movements in horror movies, and ran in the same slow motion manner around her desk, but what she saw next made her freeze, her blood turning to ice in her veins.

It was the fax machine.

Waiting for her, a knife in it's... uh, dangling from it's phone cord. It hopped closer, and closer, Chelsea could hear it's digital, heaving breath, the way it scratched against the carpet as it lunged for her, she could see the way the dials reached out for her throat, the way the incessant red ERROR light had it's sick, twisted gaze locked right on her-

And that's the end of my story. I'm like Stephen King, baby, I leave you hanging, wanting more. Or it could be because the fucking fax machine just called yet again. Seriously, how does a fax machine place calls? Especially from different points of origin? There are like, 6 separate phone numbers that call with a fax machine, it doesn't make any sense. I'm gonna start throwing punches as soon as I find out who is behind this wicked deed. Or maybe I'll just keep making hot chocolate, cause we have some in the office, and damn but that shit is good.

In a surprisingly mostly-horror-free twist of fate, Erin and I watched Marie Antoinette yesterday, and shockingly I didn't hate it. I was a bit baffled by some of the additions/omissions (such as the fact that it's Marie-Antoinette with a hyphen, the fact that Sophia Coppola chose modern day music ["I Want Candy" anyone?] and the fact that they glossed over many things, like yes indeed Marie-Antoinette and Louis XVI were killed, and oh yeah, the Princess of Lamballe didn't actually make it to Switzerland, she instead chose not to swear against the monarchy, and accordingly was gang raped by a mob, had various womanly body parts cut off, most likely had her heart ripped out and then eaten, and, to spice things up even further, had her head put on a spike which was then paraded past the Queen's prison windows. Yeah overkill!) but otherwise actually liked the movie. I did feel like I'd taken a hit of acid, especially because it kept jumping years at a time, but I guess if you want to cover an entire lifetime in the span of 2 or so hours, certain sacrifices must be made.

I want all the gambling, frivolity, and partying of her life... just without the beheading, thanks

I think it was a combination of several things:

1) Kirsten Dunst was regularly bathed during the production of this film. That in-and-of itself is huge. She's pretty, but the girl always looks like she just crawled out of a particularly greasy fryalater. Showered is a good look for you, bb!

2) Kirsten Dunst can actually act, unlike most young, blond Hollywood actresses. I have to admit that she did a really good job of portraying what it must've been like to have been Marie-Antoinette. She had her fun (and lots of it), but she was good at the close ups and quiet moments. And I have to further admit that they did a great job with aging her at the end, so that she looked older and weary and frightened, but had that same sense of innocence that really made you feel badly for her. Considering Marie-Antoinette and Louis were teenagers when put on the throne, and neither really understood the mechanics of it (ahem, among other things), you really just have to feel badly for them - they were in so over their heads.

3) I love Jason Schwartzman. And I love period dresses. Yep, that about wraps it up!

See, this is my pattern. When everyone hates something, I like it, but when everyone's raving about something, I detest it. I guess I just go against the masses - I'm a rebel. What can I say? I ooze sex appeal and a flagrant disregard for society and authority.

Smoking Santa

Days till Halloween: TOMORROW

Tis the season and all, so I thought I would regale you with a true ghost story that takes place in an eerie little town that I like to call the District of Columbia. Now let me give you some background on the area, because apparently there has been some confusion: this spooky little ghost haven is not, contrary to popular belief, in either Virginia or Maryland. The district is actually just that - an independent district located between two states, which lacks Congressional representation but makes up for that with a mayor that gets reelected riding on the coattails of his previous cocaine and prostitute benders. See, we all just learned something there - and they say ghost stories aren't educational!

Anyway.

In the district, there is a derelict building full of bloodthirsty murderers, deranged psychopaths, and foreigners of indeterminable scent: this is my apartment complex. One would imagine any spectral beings lurking around the property to be missing several limbs and quite possibly be covered in a splattered array of blood. However, I believe I have finally come in contact with a spirit, and to my great surprise, he is a peaceful, kind spirit, who is unable to enter the front door; he spends his dreary days wandering the grounds, gazing speculatively at the sky without really seeing it at all. And chain smoking close to 40 packs of cigarettes a day. This ghost is Smoking Santa.

Anyone got a light?

Smoking Santa keeps a steady guard over the front doors, almost as if protecting his beloved inhabitants from the ever-present threat of hobos, anti-abortion protesters, and Republicans. When he doesn't suspect a threat, he wanders into the bushes, his tiny, rotund body poking out from beneath a sprout of Chimonanthus, the lively wintersweet horticultural specimen (not to be confused with the bastard Chionanthus, whose fringe-tree shrub is the work of the devil.) It always gives him the appearance of an exceptionally fat elf, with the top of the bush looming like a jaunty green cap, blending nicely with his long white beard.

Okay, so he might not actually be dead. He could live inside the building, or he could even be a wandering hobo, but the man is out there close to 20 hours a day, as far as I can surmise. He is out there in the early morning when I poke my head out the window to see if it's magically snowed so that work might be canceled; he is out there when I depart at 8:30am; he is there at 6:15pm when I arrive home; he is there at 7:00pm when I go to watch tv at Erin's because I cannot function on my own for extended periods of time; he is there at 12:30am when I return home despite the fact that the temperature has taken a nosedive; and he is there at 2:00am when I go to bed, still merrily puffing away at his cigarettes, the red tip a burning beacon in the burgeoning darkness.

(Not that the darkness is technically burgeoning at 2:00am, but I really like alliteration.)

And that is my story. There is a fat old man outside my building at all hours, who resembles a squashed-looking Santa, and he smokes so many cigarettes that I'm amazed his lungs haven't violently repelled themselves in a giant fit of dry heaves. Give me a freaking break, it's the day before Halloween, my brain is hardly in top form.

In other news, since tomorrow is 1) Halloween and 2) we are old ladies that cannot handle going out and drinking when we have to work in the morning, we are having a Horror Movie Marathon! I present to you three movies we will be watching, and one we will not be watching:




Hocus Pocus: We begin with the Halloween staple; the hijinx, gleeful mayhem, and child aura absorbing that makes Hocus Pocus a Halloween classic. I used to be in love with Thackery Binx, and I wanted to grow up to be Sarah Jessica Parker's character. While I still strive to be just like a fictional portrayal of SJP's, her ditzy flirt persona has been replaced with her hard drinking, pessimistic, sarcastic journalist persona, and that fits me better. ILU, Carrie Bradshaw!



28 Days Later: I went into this movie with my ex, thinking I'd have a thrilling time, scream a little, laugh it off, enjoy getting spooked. What actually happened was I screamed so loudly for so long that I gave myself laryngitis, instead of laughing I clawed all the skin off the back of the poor guy's hand, and instead of getting "spooked" I spent the next four years sleeping with the light on, convinced that an Infected person would come bursting through my window and chew me into a bloody, unrecognizable pulp. Actually, I'm still scared of it.



Flight of the Living Dead: Well, Erin and I just watched Children of the Living Dead (the bastard younger brother of the Romero trilogy) in which the most frightening thing in the entire movie was the acting, and a rogue chicken that some PA kept flinging across the screen. I'm just hoping that there's a Samuel L. Jackson look-a-like that bursts onto the screen and screams "Let's get these mother fucking zombies off this mother fucking plane!" Zombies + Planes = my greatest fear. Seriously, that shit is just too fucked up for me.



Erotic Nights of the Living Dead: Yeah, this'd be the movie that we're not going to watch. Because as thrilling as it would be to watch a porno comprised entirely of rotting corpses rutting each other like there's no tomorrow (ah ha, maybe that is the point!) I just can't handle it. I lied before: planes + zombies aren't my biggest fear, it's pornographic necrophilia made by a fat 47 year old man that lives in his mother's basement and will never lose his virginity no matter how hard he tries. Now that is truly frightening.

Ghosts, MySpace Creepers, and The Horror of America's Next Top Model

Days till Halloween: 20
Days till Omaha: 6

I'm not entirely sure which is scarier: Halloween, the night of ghosts, mayhem and general tomfoolery, or my trip to Omaha, the great void in the middle of no-man's land. To be fair, the people in the Omaha office seem fabulously nice, and I am looking forward to meeting them, it's just that I have a deep fear of any area that is entirely landlocked. Rivers and streams and lakes don't count - it's ocean or nothing for me, my friends. It also doesn't help that just thinking about taking two different planes on consecutive days makes me want to scream and hide under my desk in the fetal position.

Speaking of hiding under my desk in the fetal position, I am tempted to do as such for two reasons: 1) it is roughly 20 degrees below zero in the office right now, and 2) I am the only one in said office, and I am convinced that there is something moving around in the main room, but I am too frightened to go and investigate the noise (meaning I have seen too many horror movies, and am too intelligent to go in and see what's making that noise that sounds just like a roaring chainsaw in the dark closet.)

Your bejeweled bell bottoms are terrifying!

In all actuality it's probably, like, a paper clip stuck in the vent, but I'll sit at my desk and convince myself that it's a zombie and I have to type very quietly so as not to catch it's attention (which everyone knows would mean I'm doomed, since I type with the grace and delicacy of an elephant.) Sadly, this is a normal state of being for me, heightened only to a fever pitch by the deliciousness that is the Halloween Spirit. I think part of it has to do with the fact that it's finally not 95 degrees with a 200% humidity rate outside; if it feels cold and spooky, and I'm stuck alone in a giant, dark office (where the hell are those back lights, anyway?) my mind shall fill in any and all blanks.

On the topic of blank spots in the brain, last night's episode of America's Next Top Model reminded us all yet again that Tyra Banks' head is full of helium and pop references to her days in the Inglewood 'hood. One would think that if she wanted the next Top Model, she'd be picking girls with strong high fashion looks, not a few commercial girls and some hideously disfigured burn victims she found when she mistakenly entered the Shriner's hospital, thinking she was at Bloomingdale's. There's maybe two, three girls top, that could actually have a shot at walking on a runway. The others are doomed forever to the hell that is the Sears Seasonal Catalogue.

This week, the ever-obnoxious Victoria got the proverbial boot. I really wanted to like Victoria, because she was a Yale student who seemed above all the stupidity and cruelty of the house, but my optimism for her ground to a screeching halt as she turned heinously prickly and began arguing with the lovable, fabulous Tiwggy at each and every judging panel. Of all people why Twiggy? She's the only one up there with any sense whatsoever - well, Nigel may have some sense, but I'm always imagining us having hot, steamy monkey sex, so I'm never actually sure what comes out of his mouth. At any rate, it has to be better than Miss J's incoherent, often times flailing ramblings.

The irony!

If you're like, 99% sure that modeling is the stupidest thing in the world, and you go to Yale of all places, why on earth would you ever audition for ANTM? You failed, you have to return to a student body that will forever, ceaselessly mock you, and everyone told you that you sucked. Congrats! Let the neurotic self-hatred begin!

Speaking of dumb pictures and even dumber people (see what I did right there? I'm leading every sub post into the next one, and tying this together so nicely it's like it was gift wrapped at Papyrus. Am I good or what?), I received a message on my MySpace account this morning, which read:

Cheklsea,

Hi I looked at your overall profile and you seem pretty cool. I liked it very much.

Your pics I have to admit were very nice, but let’s be fair. You already know that so I am not telling you anything new:)

I apologize in advance what might be perceived as a rude out of the blue e-mail. ...but I am moving from NY to DC/VA because of a job offer I cannot pass up and I don't know anyone here. It would be comforting to hang out and meet some new people. I recognize that you don't know me from a whole in the wall but I can assure you that I am normal, sensible, give people lots of space and respect their privacy. While my profile portrays a narcissistic and perhaps even an immature side of me, let this e-mail reflect a much deeper, down to earth side of me, and if you give me a chance I’m confident you’ll mirror those same views as well. So I hope you'll feel comfortable talking to me and getting to know me.

Generally I like to have a relaxed time when I first meet someone. Go out have drinks, just chilling out. Yes I do like dancing but that doesn't control my interests or the people I hang out with. It's just another type of activity I like which I have many. Makes sense?

You can IM me on hotmail as ___ If you have AIM, you can IM me as ____. If you use yahoo you can Im me there as well as a fall back option ____.
If texting is easier for you, you can do that as well. My text number is _____.

I know I hit you hard with the e-mail but at least it wasn't some 2 line boring cut and paste hello. I hope to hear from you but either way have a great day and know this…. If your pics reflect your true personality, then you’re an amazing person.

Hm, where to begin with this gem. First of all, my name is Chelsea. Contrary to popular belief, there is no "K" in my name. Second of all, of course my pictures are good, that's why I put them up there. I debated with putting up the "Drunken Chelsea Slips and Falls Down Stairs and Lands in Bloodied Heap" picture, and the "High as a Kite Chelsea Attempts Stripping on Coffee Table in Middle of Frat House" picture, but ultimately decided perhaps I wanted to portray myself in a different way. Plus, I'm wearing a ton of makeup in those pictures, so of course they're fabulous.

Moving on, I do hope this is some sort of hoax, as this just gets sadder and sadder. Okay, you're making a big move, I understand you don't know anyone in DC, but why not... oh, I don't know, make some friends at your new job? Hit up the bar at happy hour? Make small talk with your neighbors? The last thing you should be doing is trolling MySpace - given the site's statistics, I'm probably a 400 pound man that likes to capture smaller, weaker men and trap them in my basement for months on end, so you should be careful with giving our your personal information there, buddy.

And oh boy, the personal information. All I need his is social security number and I'm getting myself a brand spankin' new identity. For his sake I left the spots blank, but it's safe to assume that his screen name and email address are very similar to something like hot2trot@moron.com. It's that bad. Also, how did we get to such a "deep" level via a one-sided email conversation? Saying you're deep and mature doesn't make it so - I could say I'm Paris Hilton, but I didn't magically develop a wonky left eye and a fresh case of herpes. Sorry.

To say farwell to all of you, and to my new best friend, I end with his last comment: If your pics reflect your true personality, then you’re an amazing person. Well, since my pictures are from my brief modeling stint and from some drunken sorority escapades from my college days, then I'd say they sum me up pretty nicely: a frigid bitch with a taste for the sauce. Right on!