My Day in Prison

I've returned to my blog after many moons, ready to regale you with unique stories of my life! Don't call it a comeback! Okay okay, you can call it a comeback, but allow me to reintroduce myself:

I’ve been doing some soul-searching since my last blog post in April. Basically I’ve done some traveling for work, going to strip clubs, taking Hula hoop classes, accidentally funding the "street pharmacist" in my neighborhood and raising a rambunctiously hungry and moody bunny rabbit. I've got a huge curly afro now, so there's that. Blog posts on all of that coming soon!

Bunjamin Bunny and his stuffed friend Snow Bunny

Honestly I’ve just been lazy and not blogging like I should be. A new friend of mine stumbled upon my blog and told me I should continue writing. So on this bone chillingly cold Thanksgiving eve, while I’m being held hostage for what feels like the last 72 hours in the dingy tiled, bare walled PepBoys waisting waiting room, I dusted off the old keyboard and here we are.

Yesterday I called up PepBoys and made an appointment for my poor little VW Passat to get looked at. They told me that without an appointment it would be about a 3-hour wait if I just walked in. What is this, the line to buy Uggs on  Black Friday ? 

To make the most of my time I got here at the crack of dawn, even before the panhandlers start asking for change at the train stops. As a result my hair is wrapped in a satin scarf and tucked under a wool hat. Trés seductive like a sexy, less racist version of Aunt Jemima. Minus the pancakes of course as it was too damn early to cook anything. 

I’ve also got on mixed matched MENS gloves and I’ve had to use the bathroom since I got here. For some odd reason they don’t have bathrooms available for non-employees. Am I supposed to pee inside the germ infested kiddie toy box in the corner of the room with everyone watching? I didn’t realize going to PepBoys was like going to prison. After 3 hours I'm like "Fuck it!" Can I use the bathroom if I fill out an application? 

High above the recommended line of eyesight, loosely tethered on the paint chipped wall is a microscopic 19 inch TV.  

Why is the TV on the ceiling?

No, I’m not an elitist with a 55” flat screen at home, but I DO wear glasses. Mostly for watching TV, night driving and zombie shuffling to the kitchen in the middle of the night to get either a spoonful of ice cream or a pump of whipped cream straight from the can and into my mouth. Why dirty a spoon when you don’t have to? But this TV situation is ridiculous. I really don’t think it’s fair that I should be in need of an exorcism just to watch television while my car is being serviced.

If you choose to crane your neck 180° the holding cell shows Wendy Williams episodes on repeat. My guess as to why we’re being subjected to this brand of torture is:

         1 They are trying to brainwash us for some top secret government project.

         2 They want us to lose all since of time.

         3 When they give us the bad news about how many hundreds millions of dollars it going to cost               to fix the car, we’re happy to pay anything just to get out of here.

After a 6  HOUR WAIT a lady who arrived the same time as I did this morning, literally broke down and started crying because she had been here so long. And I thought my periods were bad?!  

About 30 minutes later the father of two children playing in the off smelling kiddie toy box started throwing toys at each other. When he said, "That's it, it's time to go," I looked up at him with a false sense of hope in my eyes. You can't be mad at the kids. Prison has a tendency to bring out the worst in people.

Finally my name is called over the loud speakers after a 7 HOUR WAIT. I could have gone to buy Uggs and gotten Starbucks in that amount of time yet I'm moments away from getting the news on my 13 year old V-dub. Is she going to be okay? Are they going to recommend I put her to sleep? We’ve had some good times, ole’ V-Dub and I.  

Even though she is slow to wake in the mornings, has parts that creak and isn’t as young as she used to be, she still looks good for her age. It’s true what they say: black don’t crack. Unless of course you forget to oil the leather seats: learned that the hard way.

Obviously I’ve been at PrisonBoys so long that I’m relieved to hear my name called, but if you think about it, can you really recall a time when having your name called over a loud speaker has resulted in something good? A visit to the principle’s office. A visit to the doctor’s office. Mall security when you got separated from your mom in Lane Bryant that one time… And I’ve never gotten my name called on The Price is Right so I’m bitter about that too.

After pleading speaking with the cashier it looks like I can either have heat in my car this winter or I can eat dinner indefinitely. While rubbing my neck, desperately trying to work the kinks out from watching The Wendy Show, I think about it for a second. Life is all about choices and what it comes down to is do I need dinner or do I need heat? Dinner is subjective anyway and I have been trying to lose weight.

But that’s why God created influenza.

And while heat would be nice when it’s 12° in Chicago, with a windshield of -141°, God also created blankets and summer time for when you don’t have heat in your car. I’d also have some extra cash to spend on gourmet whipped crème for nighttime treks to the refrigerator. Anyway, Happy Holidays!

I See You

If you keep up with me on Instagram you might have seen that I've started the fashion portion of my blog! (Look to the right hand side of my blog for the Instagram feed). I've also posted some pics of me rocking some new frames on there as well. A little while ago I was lucky enough to be invited to try out a pair of glasses from Firmoo. Firmoo is an online eyeglasses store that has everything from computer glasses to sunglasses. You can even try out your FIRST PAIR FOR FREE! 

Click to get your free pair + S&H

What I love about Firmoo   

* They have a large selection of frames in different colors and for different face shapes. You can upload your photo to their site and see what the glasses will look like before you actually purchase them! 

* The glasses didn’t take a long time to come in the mail! I do a lot of online shopping and hate when my items take a long time to get to me. I ordered my prescription glasses and they shipped out pretty quickly.

* They come with a cute black eyeglasses case, a cleaning cloth and some extra screws and what have yous just in case you need them! Nobody wants to trek to the store to buy eyeglasses screws but these frames are such high quality that you will probably never need  to make any adjustments!

  

* They are extremely affordable! You can get a pair for less than $40 (prescription included!). I actually wear prescription glasses for (driving, watching tv/movies and seeing in the dark since I have terrible night vision lol!) and have to go to the eye doctor twice a year. I just sent Firmoo my prescription and they did all the hard work.

Now I can pull off the geek, hipster or teacher looks flawlessly. I will definitely be ordering my summer pair prescription glasses from Firmoo. 

GO GET A PAIR!

Ain't Nobody Got Time For That

Have you ever seen the Instant Breakfast Drink commercial where Holly Robinson Peete is all like, “With so much going on it's essential I give my kids a nutritional breakfast”?

Bitch Please. Now I don’t have children and I didn’t even grow up eating the type of full breakfasts that you see in tv commercials, but giving your kids a chocolate milkshake that has 7 teaspoons of sugar in it can’t be all that good for them

Who is eating all this food when they wake up? I would definitely have the itis*!

If you're going to feed your kids pure sugar in the form of morning milkshakes then teachers should be able to carry tranquilizer darts with them. That way when the sugar takes over the childrens' bodies and things get out of control the teachers can shoot a quick dart to the neck of the offending child and resume the lesson plan.

A lot of people think they are being healthy by choosing items that are lite and low fat or because Holly Robinson Peete said to drink it. They don’t really know what’s good for them. But who's fault is that?

One of my good friends from high school and I were talking about the obesity epidemic the other day and she believes it’s the government’s [FDA] duty to make sure companies aren’t taking advantage of consumers. Large companies shouldn’t be able to tell you that a chicken is organic, but secretly feed the chickens inorganic corn meal, old parts of birds that were in chicken fights and jelly beans. We should be able to go to the store and pick up a box or a bag of whatever our heart desires and know that what we are buying, is what we are really getting.

The Amount of sugar in one serving of Carnation's Breakfast Chocolate Shake

And while I agree that companies should disclose all the facts about their products, I just don’t think it’s realistic to believe that a multi-million dollar company would choose honesty and straightfowardness over their bottom line. Marketing phrases like "No added sugar" and "No Trans Fat" are supposed to make you think it’s okay to eat Fishy McBites

We live in a fast paced world where we want what we want, when we want it. I don’t want to wait until next week for GI Joe Redemption to come out in theaters. Ain’t nobody got time for that! I’ve got to download it from bit torrent and watch it NOW! People want the same thing with their food. They don't want to take the time to research what they should and shouldn't be eating. They just want to eat it.

I mean, would you enjoy getting dolled up, hanging out at a bar with friends and flirting with men to find a sugar daddy to pay off your college loans? YES! Who wouldn’t? But if you’re really serious about your health then you should reschedule that appointment to get your mustache waxed, hop on the computer and find how natural your Trader Joe’s peanut butter really is.

There is no reason why a middle/upper class person of generation X or generation YOLO should not take responsibility for what they put in their mouth.  You can only make the best choice based on the facts that you are given, but if you don’t even do the research to begin with that’s your mistake.

And you know what? I love those Ikea Swedish meatballs, but in Europe, trace amounts of horse meat has been found in them. Would I eat Ikea Swedish meatballs on a normal trip to Ikea in America? You better believe it. Would I eat them in Europe after I took the time to go online and see how much sodium is in a serving of those yummy meatballs and stumbled upon this horse meat nonsense? Possibly if they were all out of chicken strips. But at least I did the leg work and know what I'm biting into: More Protein. 

What I would like to eat for breakfast

What I grew up eating for breakfast

*The Itis is when you eat a (could be large) meal and your get extremely tired/lazy/lethargic afterwards.