oh my god i just played the most intense game of scrabble ever with this chick online who COULD NOT SPELL when we were “chatting” but seemed to have the scrabble dictionary memorized. i asked from time to time what obscure words i’d never heard of meant and she kept saying, “dunno, but they always use it.” they, i realized, = people like ross, or my brother’s friend danny who played my father, a veritable guru, and insisted quite calmly that “jo” counts. sure nuff, my opponent tonite used “jo” and as i was ranting about it, my brother said, “yeah, danny got dad with that one. apparently it means boyfriend” and handed me the phone because ben was calling for me.

BUT i got her – it was neck and neck – i was sweating, i was tense (i hate competition, by the way; in real life, i would have collapsed or given up BUT that, dear friends, is the allure, power, and glory of the internet) – i was ahead by a comfortable 25 and we had picked all the tiles and i was picking the perfect places for my last 3 tiles when SUDDENLY she pulled a “w” and an “x” out of nowhere and won herself 30 points, putting her in the lead. i started screaming at the computer; i nearly shook the damn thing like an infant; until i threw down my last three, using her W, hitting a double-word score, and ending it in the wild hope that her final score, with leftovers subtracted, would be under mine.

and it was. by a single point.

now that, my friends, is a game.

anyone know anything about playing marbles? for instance, how it’s done?

for the first time last night, and only briefly, i hung out in a gay bar. after our feminist discussion group, lana and i met jay at the dupont fountain and shared the tip that a woman at the group had passed on: a “dating game” type thing was to take place at Titans, if we were interested. at least lana and i were – jay allowed himself to be dragged. lana recalled a discussion we three’d held just about a year ago, as to whether being single life-long constituted “failure” in some form. we hashed out our positions again, somewhat changed over the interim.

the bar itself, a black metal staircase above a hamburger restaurant with enviable decor, was packed and dark, with robbie williams singing “mack the knife” on clusters of tv screens along the walls. after he finished, evil britney in a red bodysuit started making eyes at us. we shuddered and concentrated on the stage set up along one side for the dating game — featuring one straight couple (an overweight, uncomfortable looking black man and white woman, in nursing skool together,) one lesbian couple (one dark-haired and aggressive, holding a beer bottle; the other blond, soft and self-effacing,) and one gay couple (distinguishable only because one of the medium-height brown-haired goofy-looking men wore glasses).

a towering man in drag plowed towards the stage past us shouting, “the jew, coming through!” made up as frighteningly as britney and sporting a huge crayola orange wig, she played the MC, and not very well. despite the amusing potential of the set-up, lana jay and i left after the first bit. people took as little notice of us leaving as they’d taken of us entering.

that was the cap to an extremely chill day where, taking advantage of our freedom from supervision at work (not that there’s ever too much to begin with), we interns watched romeo and juliet and i got absorbed in a game of scrabble online.

Is my Blog HOT or NOT? i need to know. link stolen from yami.

another intern-friendly day, meaning that all the people of substance in the office are still at the board of directors meeting. sam’s playing the avalanches who, i’m just learning, are responsible for that awful “that boy needs therapy” song i have a mental image of rosling dancing to in the barn. i haven’t done a lick of work yet. instead i’ve been shopping half, looking for new folk music. which is catie curtis’s best album? should i get come on now social? what about voices on the verge? should i go totally-new and buy the kris delmhorst cd they’re selling or if you’re feeling sinister or honesty room, both of which i have memorized even though i don’t technically, you know, have them. oh audiogalaxy, how i miss thee.

Looked at solely as a lexical unit, “fuck” is a very good, sturdy, versatile, and descriptive word. i think pulp fiction holds the record for the number of times its used in a film. and what an excellent film it is.

unhappy? i? never for long. i lunched yesterday with th’interns and my new boss, the newly-30 scuba-diving curly haired cornell law grad with a framed picture of bill and her on her shelf. lana picked me up after my writing class, we dropped in on a goodbye party for dearfriend nomi, headed to the holy land for two weeks, and then i slept over at lana’s house. when we bought breakfast this morning, two men with indecipherable accents behind the counter asked either if we were twins or if we wanted ice cream. we really couldn’t tell but felt safe smiling “no” regardless.

a metro mixup landed me with a free day, which i took to the bank and then to the mall. like good yuppies, my brother, my father and i lunched at cpk and i bought two black dresses that complement my hair. upon returning, i found that half had come through admirably: a factory-sealed pride and prejudice waited for me on my step. oh what joy it is to come home to mark darcy.

now for the debut of one of my dresses, an AU board meeting ( = free dinner for interns. all we need to do is sit there and smile).

this week’s sex and the city didn’t feel as uplifting to me as i think it was supposed to. it’s a terrific show — since liz and i discovered it, it’s become something of a ritual. hbo is my master sunday nights, starting at 8 with six feet under. shamelessly, i lie on the couch and listen, without flinching, to them gloat. they have me but at least they’ve earned me.

something about the message this week, the distinct possibility that despite the fact that you’re a skinny, attractive, intelligent, witty, wealthy, well-dressed, suave manhattanite (indeed, four of them) you could still be single at 36. that just shoots to hell every preconception i’ve ever had. i’m not exactly i make disdainful comments about marriage all the time — but that’s in reference to the next ten years. by the time i’m 36, i do want to be married, or at least in some common-law committed equivalent. it’s not so much a kid thing; i’m not sure what my logic is, in fact.

so i cried. later when my father made some nasty comment about my new bathing suit and my haircut, i went upstairs and hugged the koala for a while, and then, more productively, hugged the beauty myth, which is what i just should have done in the first place.

the preternaturally mature and self-posessed child for whom i babysat last night charmed me but left lana, who was keeping me company, unsettled. she has a 12 year old brother and is more acquainted with the requirements of the genre, whereas i just get a kick out of smart kids. certainly an interesting experience though: this one bashfully requested to hang out with us; apologized in advance for a stand-up BET show (“it’s for black people, so sometimes they make jokes about white people, so i’m sorry, please don’t be offended”); declared big daddy one of sandler’s best; asked us carefully if we were feminists — they’re looked down on in my school, he said. what do you think the word means? we asked. someone who thinks women should have options, he said, and i nearly hugged him — and shook our hands as we left, $30 richer for having spent an evening lounging in the living room worshipping television.

big daddy, i agreed, did seem like an adam sandler best, reflective of a new hollywood habit of making the hero the Dad. i don’t think i’m imagining that when i was younger, cinemales were virile and unattached. now guys grow up, decide to get married or stay within its bounds, and save little children. a return to reaganish values? the aging of the stars in question?

the babysittee had no father. perhaps his status as only child of single working mother helped form his self-sufficiency. nature/nurture: oh, who knows.

on the other hand (cuz god gave us two) i cherish books, i bring one with me everywhere; they make me cry 57 different varieties of tears, or laugh, or want to write myself; whereas i keep the &&&&&&&&& hidden within a box within a bag within a box and i don’t even remember where i buried the ^^^^ ^^^^^ or the ####-## ####, so i won’t draw any conclusions but at least i can enjoy o’hara anywhere, even a metro train.

inadvisably, i communed with a porcupine last night and have yet to recover. this was a function of an argument with my brother about college, instigated when my mother brought out my report card. i’m stressing myself overmuch, by his logic, because clearly my classes couldn’t be that hard if i’m doing well in them; and more importantly, that’s not what college is about. have fun, he chided

which gets to a more serious point in terms of the porcupine of my depression, which was waiting for me as i slowly ascended back to my room. it stared — that’s all the creatures that surround me do — and staring back, i thought: am i having fun? when was the last time i had fun? running from these kinds of porcupines in the past i’ve ended up in smoky embraces (animals fear fire) or submerged (animals drown). i return refreshed. so i’m tempted to dash to new york, except that i have dull plans: get new contacts, buy a bathing suit (the porcupine i foresee will be waiting for me in the dressing room,) get my hair cut, sulk about not going to falconridge because dammit i really should have gone because dammit my life has become too staid, too routine. i’m 20. i’ve been a 20-nothing for a week and i haven’t been drunk yet. i don’t even think i’ve broken the law. this year, instead of sex toys, i got books for my birthday, like i used to when i was a kid — not that there’s anything wrong with that — but once again (the porcupine is staring at me) i feel that rising urge to rebel.

here in my mother’s office, whiling away a slow afternoon, i’ve read about one excellently shrewd man and one popsicle.

when i met my delightful mother downtown she took me to lunch and peppered me with questions about the discussion group yesterday. she asked the same thing elke did: why is MTV worse than any other money-making corporate sleazebag TV station? when she wasn’t picking up on details like that, she got positively starry eyed just listening. didn’t you have consciousness-raising groups like that back in the day, i asked. cuz that’s what we’re told — isn’t that how the movement started? women everywhere suddenly drawn together, as though by the iron in their blood, and inspired to say in unison, “hey, what’s with that only being able to be a secretary thing? why is my place necessarily in the home? why am i chattel?”

but apparently some women entirely missed the movement. my mother claims she did. she floundered after college — no one thought to give her career advice in 1967 — through jobs where the glass ceiling was hip-high, and, disgusted, enrolled in VISTA (which is now AmeriCorps.) the next few years she spent in the company of nuns and native americans, none of whom were on the cutting-edge of revolutionary thinking. it wasn’t til she ended up in san francisco on a waterbed that it occurred to her to be a lawyer, cuz an all-male group of lawyer friends were serving draft dodger and conscientious objectors.

it astonishes me that, despite everything subtly feminist about her life those eight years between graduating college and marrying my father — whom she met when she, representing the federal government, sued him, representing NM State — she never draped over her business suit the purple big-F sash. talking to her now i feel like it’s only in retrospect, and more ironically in dealings with her “third-wave” daughter, that she’s beginning to consider it part of her identity. how many other women, you gotta wonder, are in a similar position?

maybe that’s my calling: outreach to “second wavers” who missed the boat. or maybe just writing about them.