jMcJohnson

(Ryan and I are sitting on the bed talking. Our cat, Maddux, jumps up on the bed and nips at Ryan’s wrist.)

Ryan: Aaah!
Jamie: What?
Ryan: He tried to bite me.
Jamie: No he didn’t, he’s just nipping at you so you’ll pet him. He does that to my shoulder all the time.
Ryan: A shoulder is not a wrist. The wrist has major arteries in it. I could die.
Jamie: You could. But you won’t.
Ryan: But I could. You probably taught him how to do this to me.
Jamie: Yeah, I definitely did.
Ryan: It’s part of your master plan to train Maddux to kill me, isn’t it?
Jamie: Yes. He’s a highly trained killing machine. Look in his eyes!
Ryan: You are sick.
Jamie: He’s the Manchurian Cat-didate!
Ryan: You won’t stop until I’m dead, will you?
Jamie: (to Maddux) Three of clubs! Three of clubs!

If you saw and loved/hated Twilight, this will not disappoint. Ha!

I am going to violate the cardinal rule of blogging and talk about how geez! I haven’t been posting! WTF?!

I feel like everything is going on and absolutely nothing is going on simultaneously. I have been totally uninspired to post and completely devoid of anything interesting to write about. I hate to write complain-y posts, so that eliminates all that; I try to avoid anything too personal/potentially embarrassing to me or the ones I love, so none of that; and I really am loathe to write about my annoying (and non-tragic) ongoing health issues, so that’s that. Which leaves me with…practically nothing!

Uhhh…let’s see.

We went to Chicago last weekend which was awesome and much needed. This stuff happened:
1. I ate steak tacos on THREE separate occasions. Considering we were only there for three days that’s pretty impressive.
2. I declared (while flying) that I’d literally rather eat a turd than have to fly again. Ever. And I meant it.
3. I got to see Dave and Amanda’s new and totally awesome house! They have a great contractor working on the place who is both and amazing craftsman and possibly quite depressed. We heard him declare that he “hated his life” in earnest while we looked around at the place. Awkward!
4. We played a game called Whirly Ball, which is basically lacrosse with bumper cars. It is by far the most dangerous sport I have ever been a part of, mostly because the bumper cars go insanely fast and are difficult to control. Also, there’s a huge bar outside the (track? course? Whirly room?) where you play, so being drunk is totally cool. I really can’t believe that this is a real thing that people are allowed to do. When you get hit by another bumper car, it truly feels like getting into a minor car accident. Here’s a video of us Whirly Ball-ing:

(Okay, I just watched the video again and it does not look like the bumper cars go fast, but trust me (and my seatbelt-bruised ovaries) they do.)

I also took a bunch of pictures, but I was having a bad hair weekend, so I don’t feel like posting any at this time.

Speaking of hair, I am scheduled for a cut on Friday. I’m thinking short-not Indigo Girls short, but like, cute bob short. I am trying not to chicken out; which is entirely possible, as I really enjoy hiding behind my hair.

What the hell happened to this post? It was numbered items about Chicago and now it’s about my hair.

I am boring even myself.

Tonight I saw a clip on TV showing the woman who sang “I Dreamed A Dream” on Britan’s Got Talent. Have you seen it? It’s here. You can watch it if you want. If not, here’s the deal. She’s not attractive. And when she comes out everyone’s chattering about how she’s sure to suck and the judges are smirking and then she sings and guess what? She’s good. Really good. And everyone is AMAZED that the ugly lady can sing! Can you believe it? She is disturbing to look at and YET; DESPITE that, she has entertained us!

Ugh. Barf.

I think often about how much it sucks that we human beings have such a narrow idea of what is attractive and appealing. TV, magazines, movies etc. all tell us what we should look like as well as what we should like to look at. And no one is immune, right? Even as I type this, I know that I am personally guilty of almost every one of these poor behaviors; from being too critical of myself to being too critical of others.

Look at any magazine cover-Maxim, People, Playboy, Star, whatever. There are attractive people playing their assigned roles everywhere. In fact, I posit that there are so many generically attractive men and women out there that honest to god it’s freaking BORING. I am absolutely bored of looking at these people.

Ryan is an incredible person and musician (in my humble opinion) who plays his heart out in a quasi-douchey part of town, and whenever I go in there I am amazed at the total onslaught of people who all look EXACTLY THE SAME. Generically “hot”. I mean my lord, what would happen if a guy didn’t wear an Affliction t-shirt or a popped collar? Or what if (just for one night) the girls didn’t have their cans hanging out in January or sport crispy, stick-straight flat ironed hair? Are all the alternatives too heinous to contemplate?

Don’t get me wrong, if you like looking this way, then I fully support you doing your thing. But I find it hard to believe that all these people truly have the exact same aesthetic. It’s all about playing the role that society tells you to play. Be attractive or be of no value. We are rarely presented with any middle ground.

And while we’re at it, let’s talk about fat people. I wonder constantly why people are so freaked out by fat people. Some people are skinny, some people are average, some people are fat. What’s the big deal? If those people (however they may look) want to make a change one way or the other, then great. They can make that happen. If not, why is it any of our concern? Why do we laugh at them? Are we just genetically predisposed to be disgusted by fat people? It’s skin. Literally. Just more of it. Arranged differently on each human. Why can’t they wear swimsuits? Or shorts? What makes people so disgusted by having to look at a fat person? I just don’t get it. It’s just the way they are. They are just people.

People have various reasons for being overweight. Sometimes, it’s a medical or genetic reason, or sometimes it’s because they eat too much. No one goes around spotting alcoholics and laughing at them, I mean, I’m pretty sure no one is at a bar saying “Look at that alcoholic! He’s drinking a BEER! But everyday people see an overweight person eating a piece of pizza and think “What a pig!” Why? Both conditions can be the result of addictions. Alcohol is socially acceptable and thus alcoholism is easier to hide. You have to go out of the house wearing a food addiction every day. It seems pretty unfair to me.

I wonder what could be accomplished in the world if people no longer spent so much time beating up themselves (and others) for how they look. If the number on the scale was totally disconnected from our mood on any given day. If everyone got a fair shake at life regardless of the shoes they choose to wear or the crookedness of their teeth. If we told all the conventions of society to eat shit?

I wish I could count all the little girls I have worked with in schools over the years who have cried about being too fat. Or who think that they are “too ugly to live” (direct quote). Or who have told me that they are on a diet-in third grade. It’s not ok. It’s just totally not f’ing ok.

Please don’t get me wrong…I love beauty in all it’s forms. I just think we need to broaden our definition. Significantly.

Clearly we all have a lot of work to do.

Listening to my neighbor play the guitar.

And sing.

While I watch Access Hollywood.

And eat chocolate Chex mix.

Note to self:

Time’s a-wastin’.

Ryan and I woke up around 2 PM today; for him it involved being totally exhausted after 5 grueling nights at work and for me it involved *ahem* several alcoholic beverages last night and Burger King at 4 AM. Gah. So, since it was Easter, we felt we should celebrate somehow, but nothing truly awesome came to mind.

After watching the Masters and eating Reese’s PB eggs for four hours, it finally came to us: steak. We should celebrate sweet Easter by eating giant steaks. But where? Lots of places were closed today since it was a holiday, so our pickings were slim. I browsed Yelp and found an open contender: Jess and Jim’s Steakhouse in Martin City MO. I didn’t know where that was, but I knew that they were open till 9 and allegedly had some killer steaks, so off we went in the cold rain to meet our meat (har)!

This place was easily 35-40 minutes away, which leads me to tell you all how much I love my husband who is always ready and willing to go on a culinary adventure with me anytime anywhere. One of our favorite pastimes is finding some weird obscure restaurant and eating there, no matter how far away it is. Jess and Jim’s was out in the country (sort of) and we knew we were there when we saw the giant cow on the roof of the building. This was a very good sign.

As we walked in, they were blasting country music and the walls were covered with cow horns and horseshoes and stuff. Awesome. It was pretty empty, seeing as it was 7 PM on Easter Sunday, so we were seated right away. After perusing the menu, Ryan went with the Prime Rib and I got the Lady Ribeye (it wasn’t actually called that, but wouldn’t that be a cute if not misogynistic name for a little steak?) We also got a little dish of picked beets which fortunately Ryan hates so I got to eat them all. Tasty and old school. Our options with dinner were a salad or steak soup; we both went with salads (steak soup seemed too filling and possibly meat overkill) and they came with thick texas toast (again, very tasty). The meals came with giant baked potatoes too.

We chatted for a while and suddenly we heard a loud sizzling sound-it was our steaks! Coming out on hot plates! The sound and smell was fantastic. The meat looked great and the baked potatoes were the size of a baby’s head. They were massive and covered in chopped up real bacon. Freaking awesome. The steaks were melt-in-your-mouth amazing. Ryan at one point stopped eating and was just holding his fork and staring off into the distance.

Me: Hey…what’s wrong?
Ryan: (sighs) Nothing. It’s just that I’ve never had a meal that just made me THINK, you know?

Meat that makes you think. What more could you ask for?

Needless to say, this meal was fantastic. The steaks were perfect and delicious and really the whole meal was very reasonably priced. This place looked like it would be right at home in Salina, which is probably why we loved it so much. As we left, we noticed that in the lobby there were lots of articles about this restaurant framed on the wall; from USA Today, Esquire, Playboy and more all talking about how awesome this place was. And it really was.

Hallelujah! Yay for Jesus and steak!

It seems I cannot form a cohesive thought tonight (judging by the fact that I have started and erased three entries), so here’s a catch-up:

1. Last week we went to Salina and met our nephew, Lyrik. He was super precious and SUPER chill. You know how most infants look really bizarre; kind of like E.T.? Lyrik is exactly the opposite-he is seriously cute. Later that weekend, my other (almost 4 year old) nephew ran at me butt-first and farted on me. It was totally hilarious-Lyrik, you are cute, but you have some serious catching up to do in terms of overall awesomeness; however, you are an infant, so I’ll give you a year or two.

2. Ryan and I officially have an apartment in Lawrence! As of August 1, we are the proud renters of a two bedroom, brand new construction apartment at the Alvadora complex in extreme west Lawrence. It is two minutes from the highway, is miles away from the madness that is KU, and have I mentioned it’s totally brand new?! Look, I’ll say it; we totally sold out and rented a pre-fab new apartment in a (gasp) apartment complex. I have always been against it, always loved older places with lots of character (ie: gross window air conditioners, peeling plaster, and dust from 1942 in every corner) but honestly we are tired of it. We want a break. We’ll both be commuting next year so the thought of a place with a dishwasher and a washer and dryer is pretty sweet. It’s only a year (maybe two if we like it) and after that we’ll buy a house with character (we hope). But since we have no idea where we will land once I am done with school, this place will do nicely in the interim. Do you want to see it? Of course you do. Here’s a picture of the kitchen:

So white. So clean. So freaking fantastic.

Also we have two bathrooms and the complex features a FREE tanning bed for resident use. And you know how I feel about being tan.

3. I am currently watching the show “Medium.” It is surprisingly not awful.

4. I found out my school schedule for the fall will only be three days a week, which is awesomely perfect. Wednesdays will be crazy long (including one three-hour class), but the will allow me to stay on campus and get (hopefully) a lot of reading/homework done. It will also leave time for me to work part-time; hopefully stocking shelves or watering plants or something else easy and stress-free.

5. Since we will be gone for the better parts of May, June and July, I need to seriously consider getting some boxes and beginning to pack. Aaack.

6. My stomach has been giving me issues again. I have not felt 100% since I had my colonoscopy. I am convinced that she implanted extra UC in my intestines just so I will have to have another colonscopy. Ok, so I’m not actually convinced of that, but she did say that if I had more issues I may have to get another one. Our insurance covered about 60% of the first one, meaning we have to pay for the rest (about $1900, the worst coverage of any insurance we’ve ever had) so needless to say, I am not interested in getting another one. I am hoping for spontaneous healing.

7. I went to Aldi today after an eight year hiatus. I got a killer deal on some pretty good looking produce, but just being in the store was was horrible. It was hot, it smelled like dirty underpants and the carts are so wide that if someone stops in front of you, you are stuck until they move. A kid in a cart stuck his tongue out at me. I understand how he felt.

8. Isn’t this funny?

The End.

You decide.