High School Chums

A gal I knew in high school just put this on her facebook status update: "-- is looking at wedding pics and wants to get married again- to [hubby] of course :)"

My first reaction? Flipping my computer the bird.

Luckily, I just heard from another high school chum - one who, like me, hasn't quite started on the dream job and dream husband plan yet. She's in town this weekend and we're meeting up tonight at the bar where I used to work.

Single gals unite!

Nine Shades of Shadow

I walked into the drugstore and immediately to my left found what I was looking for. I walked the full length of the wall slowly. From top to bottom there were more lipsticks, blushes, eye shadows, and mascaras than I could count.

I had to fight the urge to run as panic rushed through me. On the outside, I looked calm. On the inside I was screaming, "Amanda! Where are you?! Amanda!" I took a deep breath and reminded myself of Amanda's advice, "When you buy makeup you've got to either buy the really expensive stuff, or the really cheap stuff."

After a short, confused eternity, I settled on a set/case (whatever it's called) with nine colors and high-tailed it to the checkout.

It's impressive how intimidating that was.

The Epitome of Lazy

Saturday = First day of (the long-anticipated) Thanksgiving break. (i.e. a whole week without classes, office hours, students, or papers to grade)

What did I do on Saturday? Mostly, I sat in front of the computer, watching episodes of Mythbusters and Eureka all day in my flannel pajamas. Took a bath, shaved my legs, but didn't wash my hair and got right back into my flannel PJs as soon as I was out.

On one hand, having a full day of sloth is delightful. On the other, boring. About one day is all I can take. It's been productive on the jewelry front, though. Between Friday night and Saturday, I whipped up three new slightly labor-intensive necklaces. Now I just need to go out in public to show them off.

On the girly front, I did a hair experiment today. I twisted pieces of my hair around itself and bobby pinned it, so my whole head had little twisty knots on top. Didn't have time to dry it out all the way, but the two sections at the front got there. Right out of the twist: poodle effect. After I clipped it back and let it relax a bit, more texture than poodle. I'll have to try it again. If I can get it right, I'll do it one day when we get back from break and show Amanda.

The Double Standard Problem

I found a new blogger today: To Miss With Love One of her posts, titled Damn White People has particularly caught my eye. It's also made some people angry.

For my own two cents, I'm very much behind what she's saying. At the beginning of November, there was an initiative on my state's ballot to get rid of the Affirmative Action laws in the state. It didn't pass, and I'm sad for that. Sad, because by the very act of having such laws, we imply that folks of minority aren't qualified for job X, because of their genetics. I can appreciate the reasons Affirmative Action laws were created in the first place, but aren't we past them yet?

Part of the reason I was such a tomboy as a kid and teen was because the double standard of gender pissed me off. I had a guy friend who didn't get this. He'd treat me in a particular way because I was female. Things like censoring his language, holding the door open for me, etc. One time we were playing chess. He, the much better chess player, kept letting me win because it was the "gentlemanly" thing to do. Yeah, I wanted to win, but I wanted to beat him, not be let to win. I could have smacked him.

Double standards are inherently insulting, no matter what type of double standard they are. As someone standing on the "Old Whitey" side of the fence, I am a little concerned of how my comments will be perceived (arrogant? prejudiced?), but Snuffy's commentary hit home with me, because though she's talking about race, the same principle can be applied to gender. I don't want to be treated "special" just because I have boobs. It's insulting.

Once upon a time, my dad proposed to my mom, saying "No wife of mine will ever work a day in her life." My mom looked him right in the eye and said, "Then I'm not going to be your wife." As you can guess, they worked things out, but I never would have happened if my dad had held on to the double standard.

Subtlety: Attempt One

Subtlety is not my thing. I like things (especially in terms of relationships) to be clear. So, when in doubt, I tend to get blunt.

Back in the spring, when I was attempting the online dating thing, there was the one guy I actually met in person. We IMed, met in person, IMed some more, etc. After a while, I was unclear on whether we were doing a dating thing or a friend thing. So, the next time we were on IM, I asked him outright. He said it was a friend thing, and then I knew. Then I didn't have to worry about it any more.

When I tell Amanda this, during a conversation about The Guy, she gives me strange look.
Amanda: You like categories. You like things to be clearly defined.
Me: Absolutely.
Amanda: So, a guy is either one thing or another.
Me: That's the idea.
Amanda: Me, I'm not like that at all. When I was single I had lots of guy friends, and I slept with some of them sometimes. They were just friends I sometimes had sex with.
Me: That's the kind of thing that I wouldn't do well with.

In the context of my uncertaintly about the guy, the fact that it's more complicated than the online dating experiment, and in light of my whole girly experiment, I decided to try Amanda style tactics. This week is my break. I know for a fact that the guy has loads of free time this week. I'm going to be spending some time in the guy's area, so I ask him, "Hey, I'll be up your way, can you recommend any places for me to do some photography?"

The idea is that the guy will say something along the lines of, "Yeah such-&-such is a good spot, want company?"

Instead, the guy just said, "You might try X."

Strike one for subtlety.

Like This

This isn't the exact photo from the magazine, but the eye makeup here is similar to what Amanda thinks I need.

Racking Up Points

I did pretty well on girl points this week. On Wednesday I earned a few by wearing a new top. It's a darkish gray, jersey knit shirt that's a good style on me - kind of drapey so it highlights the boobage and hangs loose otherwise.

Amanda: You look so skinny today.

Then, on the day that I was running late and had no chance of drying my hair over the heater vent, I pulled it up in a clip.
Me: Look, I used bobby pins.
Amanda: Yay! No fly-aways.

To top it all off, yesterday I brought in the girlish magazine I'd picked up at the store, In Style. Amanda promptly borrowed it and flipped through, scoping out the photos & ads. On one page, there was a spread of different stylish makeup looks. She pointed to the Kiera Knightley photo (a smokey eyed look) and said, "That. That's what we need to do to you."

I looked. "That? For me?"

She nodded. "Oh yeah. We're going to have to wax the hell out of your eyebrows first, though."

Now, I do a little bit of plucking to avoid the uni-brow look, but wax? I'm hoping the gold stars I earned this week will let me hold off on waxing, because that is one road I really, really don't want to go down.

The Guy

There's this guy. I've known him for a couple years and yeah, there's something to me mentioning him.

Part of this whole getting in touch with my feminine side adventure has to do with dating. I am bad at it because I lack confidence. Thus, instead of doing what normal gals do - i.e. flirting - I tend to play offense.

About a month ago, I lost a friendly bet and had to take the guy to dinner. After food, we went to the bar I used to work at to play darts and pool. My former coworkers, when I was at the bar and the guy was not, asked, "So, is this a date?"

"No," I said.

Kinda felt like one though. This made me uneasy. So, I did what I do. He offered to buy my first drink. I wouldn't let him. Later, he gave me a hard time, repeating something that I said, and I made the point that my voice was not that high. This lead to a discussion of who's more butch, me or him. I started the discussion.

On Saturday, I gave Amanda the highlights. She gave me a look of abject horror. "You didn't!"

Part of me is certain this guy has an interest in me. I know I have an interest in him, and most of me thinks I've done a really good job of botching it all.

A Word About Amanda

I'm aware that, in the context of this blog, Amanda might come across as a bit... superficial. Because of what this blog is, that's rather unavoidable, but unfortunate. She features prominently here because she is my girl guru, and she features prominently as such because our conversations about clothes are more relevant here than our conversations about politics. That's the nature of the beast.

I just want to bluntly say that while she's very savvy about personal presentation, there's more to her than that. She's smart, she's ambitious, she's very keen about inter-personal relationships, etc. So, while I may set her up as something of my polar opposite, know that part of that is poetic license. The bottom line is that I'm largely going for humor here, and extremes are funny.

So there you go. I wanted to make that part explicit. In any event, if I didn't like and respect her, there's no way I'd be entrusting myself to her for this project.

Mascara

As Amanda and I were having a general kind of conversation, we went from talking about my hair (pony tails do not impress Amanda) to makeup.
Amanda: Do you even wear makeup?
Me: Uh, no.
She looked at me closely for a moment.
Amanda: You need to get mascara.
Me: Mascara?
Amanda: Yep, that's what you need.

I told her she had to talk with someone she's been avoiding before I'd do it. Quid pro quo, right? She gave me a dirty look. She's very good at dirty looks, and I should know, I've been getting a lot of them lately.

Voice in My Head

It's happened. I've been spending enough time around Amanda and I've been spending enough time talking with her specifically about this project and all it entails, that she's become a voice in my head.

On Tuesday I didn't have anything I had to look especially nice for, so I dressed down a bit - black jeans, white socks, my non-fancy black shoes, striped long-sleeve Tshirt, and a pony tail. As I stood in front of the mirror pulling my hair back, I could hear Amanda in my head, tsking my choice. "Those jeans?" She said. "You're going to work in those jeans? They've got a bleach spot!" Hands across her chest, she shook her head.

On Wednesday I wore slacks.

Omission

I went over to my folks' house yesterday to hang out with my mom, brother and brother's new girlfriend. While we were all in the kitchen my mom glanced down at my bare feet.

Mom: Ew, why are your nails painted green?

I hesitated a moment. I could tell her that Amanda made me do it, but that would lead to a whole explanation of what I'm doing and why. There, in front of mom, my brother, and the girlfriend, I just didn't want to get into it.

Me: Because I painted them green, that's why.

My mom and I are on pretty good terms these days, but I just don't think she would understand what I'm doing and why. I can see it in my head, I would try to explain it, and she would say, "But, why?" She might think I was having some kind of crisis, or just outright losing my mind. I don't know, but I can't possibly imagine her just nodding and saying, "Huh, sounds interesting." No, she'd want details, an in-depth explanation. Justification.

No thanks, I'll pass.

Postponement

Amanda's broke, so girls night is getting rain-checked. Instead, she's going to come over and I'm going to see if she can appreciate the awesomeness that is Firefly. As soon as I described it as a western, she cringed and gave me a skeptical look. Then she asked if there could be brownies and agreed on those terms. Also, it seems we'll be doing my hair. Oh boy.