Anyway, here we are.
So have you ever heard someone bitch about dumb shit like her Amazon order is 6 days late or she needs tangerines for this recipe and why doesn't this tiny, tiny grocery store carry 87 kinds of apples?
Know that thought that drifts into the back of your mind? It goes something like "why am I standing here listening to this? You could have real problems. You could be in war, or something."
They call that "first world problems".
Welcome to a blog about first world problems.
Before we dig into this can I share with you the most perplexing question I've been encountering lately in the exciting world of grocery stores?
"What are the sweetest apples?"
Reasonable question to be sure. The answer is Gala.
So I tell them that.
"Yeah I know that."
So why, why, why are you asking?
Now you're asking me to get creative with my bullshit. I have to find some other apple (usually Jazz apples though fuck if I know why I picked them out) and call that one sweet but kind of soft and then I pick out Rome apples and call them sweet but kind of tough.
Is this true?
I don't know.
Then I can direct them back to the Gala and say "but these are all around good."
Then they ask about Granny Smith.
Are you fucking with me?
Even I, an idiot making this shit up as I go along, know Granny Smith apples are tart.
I'm not just bringing this up because it happened once. It happened 3 times yesterday and I only worked 5 hours.
I'm pretty sure that one bitch was a store shopper, though. She was scoping my name tag too much.
Real subtle, Mr. Bond.
So pissed off right now --
I pre-ordered The Wise Man's Fear off of Amazon in early February, and was told that, because I'd pre-ordered it, it would be delivered on March 1st.
Speaking of things with cool names I found out there was a Warhammer game I missed called "Glory in Death" and I wanted to get it based off the name alone but then I found out it was for the Nokia N-Gage.
Seriously?
That dumbass cellphone Gameboy that looks like a taco?
Why did they make a Warhammer game for that piece of shit?
Do they hate money?
Perfect! I'd have it in time for my long plane ride home.
Well, it's March 1st, and I went online to track my order since I hadn't gotten it through campus mail yet. Lo and Behold, I'm apparently not getting it until March 7, at which point I will be in RI, and not MD, and therefore will not be able to read it during my long break. Oh no.
Well not to bring attention to this but I found this book for nothing on a less-than-legal channel in about ten seconds.
Get an e-reader, dipshit.
I am SO FUCKING PISSED right now - what the hell's the point of pre-ordering a book if you're not going to get it until after most people who order it on the day of its release?
I like digital pre-orders.
What?
It's not a physical thing that can run out, why do I have to pre-order it?
SO IT CAN UNLOCK RIGHT AT MIDNIGHT!
Yeah after 20 minutes of not being able to contact the Steam servers. Thanks for nothing, dipshits.
Today I was at Colt State Park with my dog. It's a very busy place in the early mornings and late afternoons, when dog owners bring their pets for walks and exercise; I came at about 4:15, with the sun just starting to sink and the bright blue sky fading into that palest, iciest blue of New England winter.
Let me paint you a gilded picture of the misty before dawn of humanity.
Seriously? What's wrong with you?
Why are you writing like this?
Standing by the shore today looking across the Sakonnet to Aquidneck and Connanicut islands it felt like the sky would go on forever - just this great huge clear vault. It's been so cold and dry and clear the past few weeks it feels like I could fall forever up into the sky.
Fall up.
Fall.
Up.
Are you trying to piss me off?
Wow.
This whole story is about how she's training her dog.
Thanks so much for this.
So I was in a local library today (you can use your card at any library in the state) dropping off some pamphlets for my place of work. I stopped by the FREE BOOKS table on the way out, because you never know, right?
No I pretty much know.
There were twelve or fifteen books of feminist scholarship on that table. Some were in bad repair, but many looked to have years of usable life. They were a bit dated, on the whole - 60s through 80s for most - but there were some important authors in there: Shere Hite, Betty Friedan, Kate Millett, Shulameth Firestone, Marcia Cohen. Whether or not you like those women's work (and there's a lot to criticize in second wave/radfem scholarship) they are important figures historically.
Not the Shulameth Firestone!
Who the fuck is that?
Still, I went inside the library to check out their women's studies section, in case they'd replaced the discards with more current books.
There was nothing.
I asked the Reference Librarian - who referred me to a university library.
It feels like our history is being erased.
Your history.
These people don't even register as historical figures to me, so it must be your history.
So...
It looks like I'm bipolar. Bipolar II, with severe depression and mixed manic episodes.
Well you know what they say about women--
nope, too fucking easy.
Even I have standards.
In the past several months my ability to do any extended reading - book reading - has sharply diminished. I read magazine articles, websites, and so on; I even do a little writing. But I can't pick up a book. When I do, it is invariably a children's fantasy that I have read many times before, and invariably unsatisfying. This intellectual atrophy is horrifying to me. Books have always been my greatest comfort; more than any other of our modern drugs - computer, television, video game - books offer a fulfilling, engrossing escape. They are also not shameful in my family; I do not have to feel embarrassed for wasting my life with Austen or Waugh the way I do with blogs and messageboards.
It's Deus Ex: Human Revolution.
It deals with the morality of transhumanism and cybernetics.
It's way fucking smarter than half of the shit you read to feel smart.
I have some hope, however, that this trend will shortly reverse itself: I begin work on Thursday. I'm working at America's most ubiquitous fast-food restaurant again, the same one I worked at fresh out of high school, and for once I don't feel bad about it, at least not without help from my family. It's paying work, it will get me out of the house, it's not morally bankrupt, and its degradations are no more than the usual.
It is beneath me.
This afternoon I read through the latest edition of The Atlantic Journal with incredulous dismay. I've always thought of The Atlantic as an intelligent, thoughtful magazine, but today's reading calls for a revision of opinion.
I don't have time for other peoples' opinions.
Ever consider just not reading this nonsense?
I know I am decadent in my self-destruction, that I seize onto self-righteousness as a substitute for happiness, that I have within me the seeds of a bitter, raging woman myself.
Wooooooooooooow.
Soooooo fucking edgy.
And now I'm depressed all over again, because I'm getting really damn tired of the bullcrap at home. Because books like that always make me feel like MORE of a fuck-up, not less - when I don't think about my problems, I can just sort of "barrel through" them, tell myself I'm mostly normal and not to feel any self-pity. When I sit and think for any length of time, though, I become increasingly convinced that we're all of us so screwed up none of us will ever get any better.
I mean, Jesus Christ, I had this conversation with my brother where he told me he was afraid he'd abuse future girlfriends because he's seen his father doing it; and I told him I was afraid I'd wind up with an abuser, because I don't have good boundaries or good self-esteem.
Uh-huh.
When you get done moaning I'll be sure to read this.
I'm afraid I'm not fit for medical school, that I'll "burn out" and prove inadequate.
God help me.
Enough with the self pity.
I skipped a lot of stuff.
I also find myself having one of those cliched "learning experiences" that we always rolled our eyes at in middle school, namely, that I've begun to befriend a woman with a number of disabilities, mental and physical, in my chemistry lecture; we're in the same lab section, so I've worked with her before. She's slow, but not stupid -- at first I was convinced she was just dumb, but I think she's just hard of hearing, older, out of practice, and in pain, and all of that combined can make someone competent look stupid.
I always loved that in a lab group. The head case and her white knight.
I can't be held back by this nonsense.
So I didn't let myself. I ended up doing all of the group's work.
Whatever.
I'm sure lots of people would piss about how that isn't fair but at the end of the day it needed doing and it looked like I was the only one about to do something about it, so here we are.
A brief lesson in self sufficiency.
She's also awkward as all get out. It's just -- it's so easy to feel contempt for people who don't blend in (and who don't stand out 'positively') and I find myself having to make a conscious effort sometimes not to dehumanize her in my judgment.
As long as she stays out of my way we won't have problems.
I got really upset in lecture today because Tina asks a lot of questions, and her voice is usually pitched too loud, and the questions sometimes seem kinda dumb, but sometimes are totally reasonable. And after a few minutes, every time she'd ask a question, I'd hear people in the back of the room laughing, and it just pissed me off. The thing is, Tina really wants to learn. She obviously works hard as a dog, and she cares. She'll probably get a C average by working her ass off. And some of these kids, they'll get a C average without breaking a sweat, without even trying, and they'll bitch about how awful the Prof was and how unfair her late policy was, and they'll treat people who have difficulty like dirt.
We all have our demons to slay.
That doesn't really excuse her wasting everyone's time. She should take it up with the professor after class.
How many times have I done that?
Well not many, actually, because my goal in college was to keep my mouth shut.
Everything's always come easy to me academically, so in a way I don't feel real "superiority", at least not morally, about my abilities. In high school I could guarantee a B average by doing the bare minimum of homework, because I'd ace the tests. In college, it's been a little rougher, but people bend over backwards to help me, because I'm "talented."
Manifest destiny out of the way plebeians--
It is only natural that people should want me to succeed--
But people like Tina, who work like dogs and who need help -- and who aren't terribly attractive, and not the brightest - the professors ignore them. I'm so mad; I missed last lab, and Tina told me that for the second time she had to stand for 2 and a half hours because she can't sit on the lab stools without her lower legs going numb, and they haven't provided her with a decent chair. I mean, Tina I can tell is too embarrassed to ask for help, and it's not my place to do it for her -- but shouldn't the Prof NOTICE when someone is standing for the entire lab? And ask, after class?
There are dozens of you and one teacher. If you don't bring your problems to my attention do not expect my help.
Although we might appear all-seeing I assure you that is carefully practiced bullshit.
I know I'll do well, and I can afford to cut class every now and then when I'm super depressed, because I'm "talented". And I feel sometimes like I wish I could give my gifts to people who deserve them, people who want so badly to learn and to succeed, and who have difficulty through no moral failure of their own.
I agree. I'd love to gift my talents to those who deserve them.
And I can think of none more deserving than myself.
Would someone explain to me why I can't ever find anyone interesting online who doesn't turn out to be a libertarian and/or an anarchocapitalist and/or a racist apologist?
I'm an imperialist.
I don't think we should hang out, though.
I work at a boating supplies/hardware store. It is for the most part a good job, but it's an almost all white staff, and a majority male staff.
Can't wait for the impending feminist rage.
The store is located near a number of majority-PoC housing projects but mainly caters to a wealthy sailing and pleasure-boating crowd.
What a bunch of assholes. A store trying to make money, huh. The gall.
A couple of days ago, I was at work when two young Filipino men came into the store. My manager, "Brandon", immediately told me over the radio headsets to keep an eye on the two young men.
Already on it, chief. I don't trust anyone.
I refused to follow them through the store, so Brandon did instead. The two ended up making a modest but not insignificant purchase and did nothing out of the ordinary to make me suspect them of being thieves.
A moment's lapse can damn us all for eternity.
When I asked my manager why he had been so suspicious - I already knew the answer - he told me that a certain kind of fishing supply had been stolen recently, that "only Filipinos" fish using those supplies, and that the two young men's dress - baggy pants and sweatshirts - was ideal for shop-lifting.
Don't know about the first part but the second part seems legit.
While I'm nervous enough about my job not to call my manager on the clothing excuse, I did ask him whether or not it wasn't profiling to assume that Filipino customers were automatically more likely to be thieves.
Brandon then replied that he was profiling, wasn't ashamed of it, and was "the Jack Bauer of [store name]."
Are all managers jackasses?
Is that like a requirement for the job?
But still you're an idiot for not assuming they're capable of theft. I watch everyone.
That 5'2" pregnant French bitch that comes in?
I wouldn't put it past her.
The only person above suspicion is the WW2 vet that lost a leg to a German landmine.
That said I'd never try to stop any of these people. Not worth it for organic tomatoes.
He told me that there were certain white customers who stole, too, but that in general young men who "looked like they were from the projects" were more likely to be thieves and that in future I should always keep an eye on them. I said I wasn't comfortable with that, and he told me that he was the manager and that his responsibility was to make sure nothing was stolen, and that I should just do what I was told.
You should hire me. I have no qualms about watching people.
I feel terrible that I didn't do more, but what else could I have said? I need this job desperately, and unemployment is 11% in my state. I couldn't afford to lose the job, but I feel like a hypocrite for tolerating racism.
Any advice?
Yeah.
Get over yourself.
Fuck the naysayers, I liked the motherfucking speech. Some of those lines I will remember - that leaders will be remembered for what the build, not whhat they destroy; and that we'll extend a hand provided people unclench their fists. An interesting mix of pragmatism and idealism.
Don't even know who she's quoting but it's a dumb quote.
Leaders aren't remembered for what they destroy?
What about Hitler and Stalin?
Also all the best leaders destroyed a fuck ton of shit to build something. Alexander the Great carved a bloody swathe across all of the known world to build one of the largest empires of the old world.
What about Julius Caesar?
This blog sucks, holy shit.
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