Well, I guess it ended before it began:
Misbehaving teens may be at risk for major adulthood problems
Remember that time that you spent an entire semester dreaming about fucking Luke Perry instead of learning right isosceles triangles? You're an alcoholic! Or that time when youwere 13 that you skipped school, graffiti-ed the bathroom, and then got a spine-chilling phone call from the police, pretended your mom wasn't home and then blared Metallica to drown out the whole incident? Yup - I know. I thought it was all just fun and games, too.
Anyway, I wish someone had TOLD me that I was setting myself up for a lifetime of misery. I mean, I thought those pesky adults were just being neurotic.
Monday, January 12, 2009
Friday, January 9, 2009
About that place in the valley (shudder...)
I never went back. I worked a grand total of three shifts. I spent my last shift posted up by the second stage, surly and cross-legged. I made one last, choking, sputtering attempt to talk to one of the pretzel-spitting misogynists at the bar, and it went a little something like this:
Me (leaning over from prime seat next to stage 2): Hey, how's it going?
Him: Good. You look nice.
Me: Oh, thanks.
Him: You're kind of quiet, huh?
Me: Well, I don't really know anyone here. (The place was populated exclusively by regulars.)
Him: Yeah, but you're not really talking to anyone to get to know them.
Me: Yeah...
End of conversation. I half-assed rolled my eyes and then turned back to the stage. Fuck that. I'm tired of people telling me I need to smile, or be nicer, or make more of an effort. I don't have any effort left in me to talk to uninteresting, vile people, and I'm sick of pretending that every idiot who walks into the place spits gold when he speaks.
I left early that shift, which is always exciting. But I left pretty fucking tore up. There had only been three girls working, which meant that I went onstage every fifteen minutes or so, for THREE SONGS AT A TIME. For five hours straight. So, picture it: My dogs were barking, my hair had long since gone from prettily curled to smashed in on one side and held in place by sweat. I stank. I was tired. My knees were a wreck, I had somehow cut my stomach while writhing on the poorly-maintained stage, I had a splinter in my pointer finger. In short, I was a hot mess.
I yanked my bag out of the overhead locker, letting it fall onto the shelf below. I ripped off my bikini, got dressed (slowly, painfully), splashed some water on my face and wiped the blood from my stomach. I paid the house.
"See you Monday," said the manager.
"Yeah, see you then."
I walked out into the sunlight. It was about 5:00 p.m. and I had to go to LAX to pick up my boyfriend. I knew then that I wasn't going back.
Me (leaning over from prime seat next to stage 2): Hey, how's it going?
Him: Good. You look nice.
Me: Oh, thanks.
Him: You're kind of quiet, huh?
Me: Well, I don't really know anyone here. (The place was populated exclusively by regulars.)
Him: Yeah, but you're not really talking to anyone to get to know them.
Me: Yeah...
End of conversation. I half-assed rolled my eyes and then turned back to the stage. Fuck that. I'm tired of people telling me I need to smile, or be nicer, or make more of an effort. I don't have any effort left in me to talk to uninteresting, vile people, and I'm sick of pretending that every idiot who walks into the place spits gold when he speaks.
I left early that shift, which is always exciting. But I left pretty fucking tore up. There had only been three girls working, which meant that I went onstage every fifteen minutes or so, for THREE SONGS AT A TIME. For five hours straight. So, picture it: My dogs were barking, my hair had long since gone from prettily curled to smashed in on one side and held in place by sweat. I stank. I was tired. My knees were a wreck, I had somehow cut my stomach while writhing on the poorly-maintained stage, I had a splinter in my pointer finger. In short, I was a hot mess.
I yanked my bag out of the overhead locker, letting it fall onto the shelf below. I ripped off my bikini, got dressed (slowly, painfully), splashed some water on my face and wiped the blood from my stomach. I paid the house.
"See you Monday," said the manager.
"Yeah, see you then."
I walked out into the sunlight. It was about 5:00 p.m. and I had to go to LAX to pick up my boyfriend. I knew then that I wasn't going back.
Sunday, January 4, 2009
Fuck yeah
The test was grueling. Three hours long, starting at 8:00 in the morning.
Let's bear in mind that I haven't seen the light of day before 9:30 am in about six months. But I did it -- I woke the fuck up at 6:30 so that I could have a leisurely breakfast and coffee like a normal person, instead of leaving myself 15 minutes to take a shower and drive like a bat out of hell to get to the test center in time, which is my instinct.
I wasn't nervous at all until I set foot in the test center. It was sterile, and the waiting room looked like that of a dentist's office. I wasn't allowed to keep any of my personal belongings with me, including my sweater, so I felt like a naked little fawn, trembling and yawning uncontrollably as I waited for my name to be called to begin.
The first section was kind of a warm-up -- essay writing. But the second two sections, quantitative and verbal, were kind of like slowly driving burning stakes through each of my eyes. I sat staring at questions, knowing that the answer was simply not within my grasp, for ten minutes at a time. With each question I couldn't anwer, I became more and more certain that I was ruining my future, that I had now officially become a complete fuck-up by not studying hard enough. Fortunately, I was so focused that I didn't have time to worry too much about the impending irreparable damager I was doing to my life.
About two hours into it, the guy sitting next to me -- who had almost not been allowed into the test because of some problem with his I.D. -- apparently became just as agitated as I did. As I struggled with antonyms, he began tapping his pencil on his desk. In a room where there is no other noise, the tapping of a pencil is like Chinese water torture. I lightly tapped on our shared cubicle wall, so as to kindly remind him that there were other people taking the test. He stopped for a second, then began again. Just as I had mustered enough righteous indignation to lean around and Say Something, he stopped again.
Thank God. But not ten minutes later, this asshole calls over the proctor, and in the middle of the complete and utter silence, begins a conversation with her in full voice. I waited, and waited, for him to realize the error of his ways. He didn't. Kept talking. Finally, I leaned around my desk and stage-whispered, "Stop talking over there! Jesus!"
Anyway, by the time I was done with the test, I was over it. I had completely fucked it all up, clearly, and was going to fail and never get into graduate school and therefore never have a shot at any career that doesn't involve being naked. That's cool...I mean, I can handle stripping forever (i.e., until age 40). But sweet jesus, praise be...at the end of the test, I hit "receive scores," and what do you know - I got a high enough score to get into the schools I'm applying to.
Unprecedented joy, followed by the burning desire to get the fuck out of that place as quickly as humanly possible. I grabbed my shit and ran out the door. I wanted to go home, celebrate, and never fucking think about fractions or algebra again.
Let's bear in mind that I haven't seen the light of day before 9:30 am in about six months. But I did it -- I woke the fuck up at 6:30 so that I could have a leisurely breakfast and coffee like a normal person, instead of leaving myself 15 minutes to take a shower and drive like a bat out of hell to get to the test center in time, which is my instinct.
I wasn't nervous at all until I set foot in the test center. It was sterile, and the waiting room looked like that of a dentist's office. I wasn't allowed to keep any of my personal belongings with me, including my sweater, so I felt like a naked little fawn, trembling and yawning uncontrollably as I waited for my name to be called to begin.
The first section was kind of a warm-up -- essay writing. But the second two sections, quantitative and verbal, were kind of like slowly driving burning stakes through each of my eyes. I sat staring at questions, knowing that the answer was simply not within my grasp, for ten minutes at a time. With each question I couldn't anwer, I became more and more certain that I was ruining my future, that I had now officially become a complete fuck-up by not studying hard enough. Fortunately, I was so focused that I didn't have time to worry too much about the impending irreparable damager I was doing to my life.
About two hours into it, the guy sitting next to me -- who had almost not been allowed into the test because of some problem with his I.D. -- apparently became just as agitated as I did. As I struggled with antonyms, he began tapping his pencil on his desk. In a room where there is no other noise, the tapping of a pencil is like Chinese water torture. I lightly tapped on our shared cubicle wall, so as to kindly remind him that there were other people taking the test. He stopped for a second, then began again. Just as I had mustered enough righteous indignation to lean around and Say Something, he stopped again.
Thank God. But not ten minutes later, this asshole calls over the proctor, and in the middle of the complete and utter silence, begins a conversation with her in full voice. I waited, and waited, for him to realize the error of his ways. He didn't. Kept talking. Finally, I leaned around my desk and stage-whispered, "Stop talking over there! Jesus!"
Anyway, by the time I was done with the test, I was over it. I had completely fucked it all up, clearly, and was going to fail and never get into graduate school and therefore never have a shot at any career that doesn't involve being naked. That's cool...I mean, I can handle stripping forever (i.e., until age 40). But sweet jesus, praise be...at the end of the test, I hit "receive scores," and what do you know - I got a high enough score to get into the schools I'm applying to.
Unprecedented joy, followed by the burning desire to get the fuck out of that place as quickly as humanly possible. I grabbed my shit and ran out the door. I wanted to go home, celebrate, and never fucking think about fractions or algebra again.
Thursday, January 1, 2009
a stripper studies
For the past three days, I've been studying like a madwoman for the GRE's. The first practice test that I took indicated that my intelligence level would barely have saved me from being forcefully sterilized in the early 1900's. Promising. The second practice test was a little bit better, which gives me great hope that when I take the test TOMORROW, I'll fare well enough to get into schools that regularly struggle with their accreditation.
OK, OK, that's an exaggeration. But still, this thing tests concepts that I haven't seen in well over 10 years (enough said). I have a running list of concepts that I need to go over, like fractions, exponents, factoring, etc., and I associate almost all of them with sitting in a crowded middle school classroom and drawing on my jeans as Mr. G stood at the front of the room writing on the board and cracking nerdy math jokes.
That was around the time that I was completely checked out of school. In fact, I think it was in that very math class that my friend C. pierced my ears with a safety pin. Multiplying fractions = bloody earlobe. I still did pretty well in math, enough to save me from having to retake it the following year. Anyway, don't you remember that some straight-shooting adults always told you that you'd never use math in the eral world? Which is true, but what they don't tell you is that all that time is completely, utterly wasted becuase not only will you not use the concepts, you'll actually forget them altogether. Your seive-like mind will not retain them in favor of grown-up concerns like, should I drink in Hollywood or Santa Monica tonight?
Anwyay, enough time on this. I have to study. Wish me luck tomorrow!
OK, OK, that's an exaggeration. But still, this thing tests concepts that I haven't seen in well over 10 years (enough said). I have a running list of concepts that I need to go over, like fractions, exponents, factoring, etc., and I associate almost all of them with sitting in a crowded middle school classroom and drawing on my jeans as Mr. G stood at the front of the room writing on the board and cracking nerdy math jokes.
That was around the time that I was completely checked out of school. In fact, I think it was in that very math class that my friend C. pierced my ears with a safety pin. Multiplying fractions = bloody earlobe. I still did pretty well in math, enough to save me from having to retake it the following year. Anyway, don't you remember that some straight-shooting adults always told you that you'd never use math in the eral world? Which is true, but what they don't tell you is that all that time is completely, utterly wasted becuase not only will you not use the concepts, you'll actually forget them altogether. Your seive-like mind will not retain them in favor of grown-up concerns like, should I drink in Hollywood or Santa Monica tonight?
Anwyay, enough time on this. I have to study. Wish me luck tomorrow!
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