State of the Tulane Chris: Part II

Tulane Chris is Relieved: Wacky Wanda is gone! We thought she left a while ago, but then she kept knocking on the door. We never saw her move out, but she hasn’t been seen in weeks. There’s no sight quite like two grown men crouched on the floor, taking shallow breaths through their mouths, gauging the distance to the knife drawer as the door goes tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap. She had a long, emotional hallway goodbye with Girl-Who-Slams-Doors, thanking GWSD for all the “positive energy.” On the free table, Wacky Wanda left some tea, one small box of Sun-Maid raisins, one shoe, and about fifty CDs. They were all what I think of as 90s lesbian music (confirmed by Giant Camel, whose mother was a lesbian in the 90s): the Cranberries, Melissa Etheridge, Indigo Girls, Sinead O’Connor… This raises so many questions. She was so weird in big, huge ways that the thought of her being weird in an everyday way like being a lesbian just blows my mind.

Tulane Chris is Underslept: The other day, the fire alarm in our building went off for three hours. “The wiring” had gone wrong and no one could get it to turn off. The super lives an hour away and the alarm company’s 24-hour helpline is an answering machine. You know what Philadelphia’s like in the middle of the night? We tried to take a walk, but turned around when we saw a man literally fighting his reflection in a store window. Later, an extremely drunk African-American lady showed up and started making small talk. She asked if we were standing outside for some kind of protest. The woman she was talking to didn’t feel like dealing with a drunk just then so she left, causing the drunk lady to open up to Giant Camel and me about her experiences with racism. She was sure we’d had them too, because “you know how white people are…” Now, Giant Camel is technically white but ambiguously brown in appearance, but Pocahontas aside, you cannot look whiter than I do. If I were an X-Man, my superpowers would be getting sunburned, avoiding racial profiling, and getting good service at restaurants. I didn’t know how to answer this so I just said, “Oh, I think we’ve all had a bad night,” to which Giant Camel helpfully added “HE’S PRETTY WHITE, THEY CAN DO AN X-RAY ON HIM WITH A HUNDRED WATT BULB.” Later, when the alarm finally got shut off and we all went to bed, the drunk lady just went right on upstairs, but I’ve never seen her again, so I don’t know if she lives in our building or was incredibly confused in the morning.

Tulane Chris is Meta: I wrote a whole post about how it’s uncomfortable to blog about looking for jobs when you know prospective employers might read it, and then didn’t post it because I didn’t want prospective employers to read that. Then I got a job interview. So… good call?

Tulane Chris is Reflective: I started writing a memoir. My goal is to avoid being described as “the poor man’s Augusten Burroughs at risk for diabetes.” The first chapter is about my mother’s obsession with her reproductive organs and is called “Female Trouble.” There is also, apparently, a performance art piece about endometriosis called “Female Trouble,” which you can see a preview of at www.femaletrouble.org. I feel no need to see it because, as you will read in my memoir, most of my childhood was a performance art piece about endometriosis.

Tulane Chris Has Vague Opinions about Prominent Women: The night of the horny goat weed, I wrote “MICHELLE OBAMA JANE LYNCH” on the page of blog ideas in my notebook. I think my point about Michelle Obama is that she’s one of the very rare people who look better in still photographs than when actually moving and speaking – she moves her face a lot when she talks and I find it distracting. I don’t know what I wanted to say about Jane Lynch, but I like her.

Tulane Chris Learned Something Amazing: Roseanne made a kids’ sing-along video called Peanut Butter and Jellyfish. It’s enough to make me have children.

Tulane Chris is Judgmental: I saw two people at Starbucks who had taken chairs away from another table so they each had a chair just for their coats. The one was yammering about real estate on the phone, and the other was doing something on a Mac with a “Nightmare Before Christmas” sticker placed on it so that Jack and Sorry-Don’t-Remember-Her-Name were silhouetted in from of the apple. Don’t you feel like you already know way, way enough about them?

Tulane Chris Likes Labored Jokes: I want to start a band that sings about skin cancer awareness and immigration reform. It will be called “Irregular Borders.”

Tulane Chris Likes Social Commentary: You know what I realized the absolute defining activity of our generation is? Our Woodstock? Using food stamps at Trader Joe’s. We will absolutely reminisce about that in decades to come. (Guess what I was doing when I realized this.)

Tulane Chris has Body Issues: I have exactly the wrong amount of chest hair. If I had more or less I could manage, but as it is it looks like my torso was just now sodded. It’s also asymmetrical. This makes me feel like a freak.

Tulane Chris Remembers Childhood Summers: What the hell was that Tiger Blood flavor? Just grenadine? I got it because little boys like tigers and blood, but it didn’t taste good.

Tulane Chris Remembers High School: Do you agree that there’s such a thing as a High School Name? For example, I went to high school with someone named Amber Pajeski. Doesn’t that just sound like the name of someone you would have gone to high school with? Nathan Langford. Chase Hawn. Katharine Cunningham. Bill Schaffer. Sarah Brinsley. (I tweaked the spelling of these for obvious reasons.) I could name a dozen more. And these aren’t just people I happen to remember – I barely knew a couple of them, and am not in touch with any of them now – but they have such High School Names. They fit so well into the sentence “______ let ______ get to third base in his car and ______ told everyone.” I tried to generate fake ones as examples, but I couldn’t – you just know when you hear one.

Overall State of the Tulane Chris: C+

Here's what just happened:

NOPE. NOPE. NOT AT ALL, MEGHAN. NOT AT ALL.

State of the Tulane Chris: Part I

Well, that sucked.

I had some blood drawn in December when I changed doctors, and about a week later the nurse called to tell me everything was “fine.” Well, last week I thought, “You know… college. I’d like to make sure my liver is working,” so I called to ask for a printout of the lab results, and everything is not “fine.” I’m not dying, but…

-     HOMEBOY IS TOO FAT. My blood is apparent the vampire equivalent of a Mallowmar. It doesn’t so much “flow” as “ooze.” My general cholesterol level is low, but it’s essentially all bad cholesterol – and guess who’s coming for dinner? Diabetes. It’s not here yet, but it’s got my address and is getting directions from Google Maps. It texted metabolic syndrome to see if it wanted to come too but hasn’t heard back.

-     HOMEBOY HAS AWFUL HEREDITY. Apparently I carry three out of four genes “associated with sudden ischemic heart disease,” or as I like to call it, “heart-gonna-explode-pox.” I also have a gene that means I can’t take popular cholesterol-lowering drug Plavix, because it might kill me.

-     HOMEBOY IS DEFICIENT. In Vitamin D and “omega-3 oils.” No wonder my bones snap in a stiff wind and my hair is dull and lifeless.

And this is just the shit I can understand. Silver lining is that my liver seems to be tootling along just fine, turning its homework in on time and getting eight hours of sleep at night.

Now, here are my emotions about the above:

-     GRANTED, I’m too fat. I did not think I had been NEARLY fat enough for NEARLY long enough that my pancreas felt it had to sit me down for “the talk.” I don’t think this is fair.

-     I have a guardian angel. About four years ago, I was so poor I almost took part in a clinical trial for Plavix. This involved taking enormous doses of Plavix and eating oranges “to see if it would still work.” I got strep throat the day before and couldn’t do it. This, you know, might have killed me. (I’m exaggerating, but not by a lot.) I like to imagine my guardian angel – I’d say it was Rue McClanahan because she apparently likes me (MORE ON THAT NEXT WEEK!), but she was still alive – floating to the hospital, touching her wand gently to a pile of medical waste, floating back over my sleeping form, and then scratching the hell out of my tonsils with her infectious wand.  (I also clearly like to merge the concepts of guardian angels and fairy godmothers.)

-     Sometime this week, my mother, uncle, and aunt will all get letters from me warning them not to take Plavix. I wrote these on postcards because I think if I amuse the postal workers they’ll be more likely to bring me my mail on time.

-     To remedy my “severe” omega-3 deficit, I’ve started taking fish oil. This results in three or four sardine-flavored burps each day. Since I can no longer have sweets, I’ve decided to try to think of the fish burps as a new dessert concept. It is not working.

-     I’m mad as a Goddamn hornet. Why the hell didn’t the doctor think this was worth telling me? It’s not like it takes much time to say “Lose thirty pounds YESTERDAY and occasionally make eye contact with a multivitamin.” I want to write a furious letter, but I’m afraid they’ll then want me to come back in and retake the bloodwork, and I want to have a few months to do better before being confronted with more red-bordered numbers.

-     I have a new game called “Diabetes Is Watching.” I’ve created a personality and work history for diabetes so I can think of it as a person I’m avoiding through good judgment rather than a fatal metabolic disease I’ll develop if I keep frying ice cream. Here are the text messages I sent Butter Legs about my new enemy diabetes last night:

Diabetes: it’s watching.

Diabetes: it knows the last four digits of your social security number.

Diabetes: it just made eye contact with you from across the bar and tipped its Kahlua Mudslide in a little salute while raising an eyebrow flirtatiously.

Diabetes: it has one IMDB credit – the prisoner early in “Silence of the Lambs” who sexually harasses Jodie Foster.

Diabetes: it thinks your screenplay is a weak attempt to be the next Todd Solondz.*

Diabetes: it saw a typo on your resume and didn’t tell you.

Diabetes: IT KNOWS WHAT YOU ATE LAST SUMMER

Diabetes: the honey badger of metabolic disorders.

Diabetes: it donated forty-five dollars to the Santorum for President campaign in your name.

Diabetes: it can tell you’re not a virgin.

You know what’s going to suck? Diet and exercise. I’d almost rather die, but I have so much TV to watch. If “Roseanne” isn’t a reason to stay alive I do not know what is.

*UM DID YOU KNOW THERE’S A SEQUEL TO “WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE” CALLED “PALINDROMES” THAT BEGINS AT DAWN WEINER’S FUNERAL AND IS AAAAAAAAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLL ABOUT ABORTION? I learned this recently.

2 Birds Investigates: Epimedium

When Chris was here helping me reassure the blog that everyone gets their period and they can go back to school and none of the boys would be able to tell, we decided it would behoove us to get a few investigations done. The problem was—as it always is—we didn’t have money to investigate anything cool like acupuncture, belly dancing, or paying my Comcast bill. With ten-dollars and a coupon for a free deck pressure washing between us, Chris had an idea:

“You know when you’re at the gas station and there are all those pills by the cash register like, ‘STAY UP LATER!!! STUDY HARDER!!! FUCK YOUR WIFE LONGER!!!’?”

Yes…

“Well, I think we should both take a shit-ton of the fuck your wife longers and just see what happens.” And with that, 2 Birds Investigates: Boner Pills was born.

After discovering that the only natural aphrodisiac my CVS sells is a 15-ounce can of Bartlett Pears in heavy syrup, we got lazy and turned to sweet Lady Internet to solve the problem for us. After 30-minutes of searching drugstore.com for a product that we only had the vaguest concept of (Chris what exactly should I be looking for? “You know…like all-natural do-her pills.” What, like ExtenZe…? “Meh. Maybe.”), I stumbled upon Desire-X Horny Goat Weed:

PLINKO!

According to the bottle, “This exotic formula contains Horny Goat Weed, a natural ingredient that has been used for centuries. Horny Goat Weed stimulates sexual desire in both men and women, and has a long history as a top aid for erectile function in men. Also included are other powerful sexual energizers like Maca, known as Peruvian Ginseng and used by ancient Incas as an aphrodisiac. This complete formula combines recognized natural ingredients that have been shown to promote desire and performance.”

According to Wikipedia, Horny Goat Weed (aka Rowdy Lamb Herb, Barrenwort, Bishop’s Hat, Fairy Wings, or 淫羊藿) is a hardy perennial in the Epimedium genus of flowering plants, endemic to southern China and other parts of the mysterious Orient. Its garden use is as a beautiful ground cover plant. Its human use is to treatment erectile dysfunction and osteoporosis. (One way or another, it firms you right up. ZZZZZZZING!!!!) Given that it works on both men and women and was on sale for $7.69, we ordered a bottle and laid out our plan: we’d both take a few big ‘ole handfuls, sit next to each other on the couch, sip some Prosecco and see where the night took us. We then spent six hours arguing that if we did do it, and I did get Megnant, what would we name it— Julia Sugarbaker or Pilgor? (~*TEAM PILGOR!!1!*~)

A few days later, our Horny Goat Weed arrived (thank Christ for discreet packaging) and as the sun intentionally brushed the skyline with its breast as it set, we got ready to get busy.

Step 1: Make yourself beautiful

I asked Chris which of the following erotic lingerie scenarios would get him in the mood:

- Schoolgirl, preppy

- Schoolgirl, badass

- Sweet ‘n sensual

- Bored housewife

Without hesitation, he requested Schoolgirl, badass. I took this into consideration and didn’t “disregard it”, per se, but did make the executive decision to go with B-level call girl from 1988. Mostly because it felt like a backcombing night.

(Sidenote: It’s worth mentioning that I got this negligee from Victoria’s Secret when I was 17 because I was like, I’M IN COLLEGE! I NEED SOMETHING SEXY TO WEAR WHEN I HAVE ALL OF THE…SEX! Clearly my idea of “sexy lingerie” was based on the erotic power of mesh and all four Revenge of the Nerds.)

Chris then proceeded to use his tongue scraper and put on a fresh coat of Old Spice. It’s the thought that counts.

Step 2: Set the scene

Chris decided it was only polite to buy me dinner first, which meant he microwaved two of my frozen burritos, set the table, lit a single candle, and relied on the Toni Braxton Pandora station to add a sensual note to the proceedings.

Yes, those are martini glasses filled with half a bottle’s worth of Horny Goat Weed. My boo is classy as shit.

Step 3: Cover all bases

Step 4: Down half a bottle of Horny Goat Weed capsules

Make sure to cheers first!

Step 5: Enjoy your frozen burrito

Step 6: Put on a good old fashioned skin flick

For somewhat obvious reasons, we had a hard time thinking of porn that would appeal to both of us. We decided to meet in the middle and go with the Switzerland of erotica: a special edition DVD of Vivid’s highlights of ’94. It was that or each use our own laptops with headphones, or as I call it, “Monday”.

Results

Well…it wasn’t exactly what we were expecting. I don’t think either of us got that horny. Chris did reach out and grab my left breast at one point, but it was halfhearted and nothing new. We really did give it the old college try, though. We watched porn for well over an hour sitting uncomfortably close to each other, but at the end of an hour, all we had was a page of snarky notes:

- “I see London, I see France, I see crushed velvet underpants!”

- “Is that a gal or a surfer”  (This question arose several times)

- “This sounds like the transitional scene music in a black sit-com”

- “Don’t you think she looks like Cloris Leachman??” (She did)

- THAT ACTOR HAS A MOLE WITH IRREGULAR BORDERS

As the scene shifted to a pizza parlor where things were not where they seemed, we noticed we were laughing hard, even for viewers of 90’s porn, and that another burrito sounded awesome. I changed into my pajamas and we turned off the porn to find that Role Models was ending and was about to play again in five minutes. This news was way too exciting. As I crammed yet another chip/carrot/blob of hummus into my mouth, I locked eyes with Chris and we came to a startling discovery: we were totally stoned. It was a surprise, but frankly we had no objections. Being stoned, we naturally had a series of stoned ideas. Most of these were about hugs, but I also decided to see what would happen if you tried to smoke Horny Goat Weed.

The answer is you burn it and then inhale a mouthful of hot plant dust, then make a series of hilarious faces as you wipe your face on the strap of your sports bra.

As the evening went on, I ate a lot of cheese and thought too much about my own mortality, and Chris peacefully read The Hunger Games curled up on the couch. All in all, it was probably more fulfilling than actually having intercourse. ~*TEAM PEETA!!!1!*~

State of the Meg—April 2012

- A lot of truly God-awful things have happened over the last few months and I don’t want to talk about it. Which is obnoxious, I realize, because then why did I bring it up in the first place? I don’t know. I’m like that asshole who casually drops it into conversation that they were molested but that's where the story stops, so you spend the rest of your friendship not knowing which family member to resent on their behalf. Not that I’m saying people who have been molested are assholes. People who are withholding are assholes. It just so happens that some of them have been molested. Really, what I’m trying to say here is that I’m an asshole who—TO MY KNOWLEDGE—has never been sexually molested. Good. I’m glad we're off to a good start.

- In other good, non-molestery news, I got into grad schools! Yay for me. YAY FOR SCHOOL! I got a creative writing scholarship to The New School, so that’s where I’ll be going. For a while I was bummed out because this means I have to turn down my spot at Columbia. I couldn’t figure out why that prospect upset me so much until I realized that in my mind, I’ve always equated Columbia with Hogwarts. I don’t really know why, considering I’ve physically been to Columbia and seen firsthand that it is in no way a school of witchcraft and wizardry. Yet on some subconscious level, I think I’ve been imagining myself spending the next two years flying around the Upper West Side with Evie on my broomstick—just writin’, playin’ Quidditch, havin’ the occasional gab session with Professor McGonagall. That said, I did the math and worked out that a round trip ticket to Orlando, two nights at the Econo Lodge, and a day pass to the The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios is $100,583 less than getting a creative writing MFA from Columbia. Soooo, that is the route I will be taking.

- HA HA! I’m just kidding, I can’t afford a trip to Orlando. If I could, I’d already be knee-deep in Kevin Yang and Gatorland by now.

- So, yes, I’m moving back to New York in July, probably. I feel the following about it: excited, scared, nervous, anxious, hopeful, loose bowels, scared. If you live in New York and would like to be my friend, that would be awesome. I sleep a lot and have a generally poor outlook on life, but I also love road trips and give good hugs. I feel like it balances out in the end.

- What does this news mean for the blog? Nothing. If anything I hope it’s going to get the blog back on track because now I totally feel motivated to write more. Chris is actually here right now to help me pick the blog up off its face and make it a part of your life again. He’s currently lying on my couch, just a tippy-tappying away. He just looked off into the distance thoughtfully, ruffled his hair, looked like he got an idea, and went back to typing. You know what? Good for him. I’m glad he worked through that. Oh, nope, he’s back to looking in the air worriedly. Now he’s fixing his sleeves and staring at my bookshelf. Back to typing. He’s got it. What a pro. I mean, I could live-blog Chris writing a blog post indefinitely, so I’m going to stop myself now before this gets any worse. (Although it’s worth noting that the only thing I can make out on his word document is “A Very Special Episode of Roseanne”. I don’t know what he’s got up his sleeve, but I am excited.)

- You know what’s a really big part of my life right now? Being livid that this exists/was recently featured on Gizmodo:

What you’re looking at is Grand Trunk’s hammock compatible sleeping bag, or as you may know it better, a SLAMMOCK, the invention I came up with in the summer of 2005 when I boldly asked myself, “Meg, what is the most comfortable sleeping scenario you can think of?” and stared back at my truth: a sleeping back in a hammock. You may also remember that everyone (including my parents) mocked me when I tried to make it a reality in my sophomore year dorm, and the inventor of The Tinge further mocked me via email because I made the extremely legitimate point that most ladies don't want to rub their junk on razor blades. And now my invention—NAY, dream!—is being sold for $180 by someone who is not me.  Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssucks.

- Yesterday was my birthday. I’m 27. Helena got me a bag of weed and Laura got me a subscription to the large-print version of Reader’s Digest, and every time I think about it I want to burst into tears because when you find two people who just get you like that, you probably shouldn’t move 230 miles away from them.

- I have two camping trips planned for the near future and I’m so excited. Slash I need to get new batteries for Hat.

- Speaking of Hat! I forgot to tell you about my new phone cover. Check it out:

I know what you’re thinking: “Is that a Real Tree phone cover?” No. It’s one step better: it’s a knock-off Real Tree phone cover. I got it for $6.99 on Amazon and it’s a major part of why I’m alive right now. I like it because it makes me feel American. I changed my ringtone to Toby Keith's “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (Angry American)” and renamed my phone Rickywayne after my favorite contestant on Heavy. Every time I plug it into iTunes it says, “Rickywayne_LEAVE ME ALONE! is synching”, and I just laugh and laugh and laugh…

- Speaking of the depressing ways I choose to entertain myself, my newest hobby is teaching myself bass lines to 311 songs, playing them, and then laughing out loud. The end.

- Chris update: Now he’s sitting upright on the couch, slumped down slightly, playing with his facial, and looking concerned.

- Chris update II: Ah, it’s because he’s hungry and wants to know if I’m cooking dinner tonight. No. No, I’m not.

- Chris update III: Chris is making a frozen burrito.

- My allergies are killing me. WHICH REMINDS ME! The Blogologues are performing my blog post A Humble Apology in the run of their current show, Blogologues: Younger Than Springtime! I’m so honored, I can’t even tell you. The show runs Thursdays-Saturdays, April 13-May 5^th at The Players Theater in the West Village. Tickets are available for purchase here, so if you’re in New York, go see it! Becca and I are going this weekend and I can’t wait! Slash, I can wait because the reason I’m going to New York this weekend is to attend an accepted student’s reception at The New School, which sounds like a lot of forced mingling/networking. ‘Ehhhhhhhh… It’s on 4/20 (~!LOL!~), so I can’t decide if I should get high before to make said mingling easier, or wait and get high after as a reward for being able to interact with people like a normal fucking human being. Or both…? 

- I got an upper endoscopy done a few weeks ago (more on that in a later blog post), and one of the questions the nurse asked before the procedure was if there’s any possible chance that I could be pregnant. I answered no, because obviously the closest I’ve come to having sex recently was sleeping through a rerun of Silk Stalkings on the TV Guide Network last month, and I swear to God, the nurse stopped writing, looked up from her clipboard, raised a suspicious eyebrow and asked, “Are you sure?” I can’t tell if she asked that because I look fat and pregnant, or because I look so slutty that I obviously lost the Trapper Keeper detailing all the dicks I've fucked lately and a baby??!!—YOUR GUESS IS AS GOOD AS MINE!!!!!1! Either way, I’m offended. Just slightly less by the chorus of dicks/your guess, my guess option.

- Did you know you have to take a drug test to work at the Ford’s Theater gift shop? HA HA! Neither did I!

- I don’t understand the appeal of LMFAO. Their songs just sound like technology and foolishness

- Also, I don’t care for DayGlo.

- I have to pee, but I don’t want to get up.

- Here’s a picture of Evie disrespecting my dad’s dry cleaning:

- OK. I feel like I can’t think of anything else going on in my life right now that isn’t part of a future blog post and/or horribly depressing, so this is going to have to suffice for now.

State of the Meg: Like a polyamorous relationship or trying to go blond: it’s complicated.