Hot People Aren't Hot (Messes)

Do you know someone that has an innate tendency to draw awkwardness from far and wide?

For most of my friends, I'm that person. I don't understand how I can possibly do it so regularly, but I certainly manage.

Here's a little background on my current living situation: I'm boarding with an uncle and his family (including my thirteen-year-old cousin) on the outskirts of town while I intern at a hospital on the other side of town. As you know, it's a long bike ride. So, sometimes, I take the bus.

This means that I occasionally (or frequently) need bus tickets. Anyway, it was a Saturday, and I just happened to need bus tickets for non-work-related reasons - I had a social engagement that evening and since I could send a cab driver's child to a reasonably priced technical college for the fare value to take me from downtown home, I opted to take the bus. Unfortunately, I was out of bus tickets. My cousin also needed bus tickets, so I told him I'd drive him (in his mother's car) to the drugstore to pick some up. On the way there, I also remembered I was fresh out of a few other things...you know...deodorant, conditioner, prophylactics...

So when we left the car, I mosied on over to the requisite aisles - Hair Care, Personal Care, Family Planning, assuming my young companion had gone straight to the cash to pick up his tickets. It wasn't until I was holding the box of condoms that I noticed he'd been following me the whole time. He had a deer-in-the-headlights look. I'm quite sure that even my THOUGHTS were in slow motion..."Noooooooooo-o-o-o-o!!!!" We headed to the cash in silence, purchased our tickets and my sundries and went back to the car. Once there, I felt I needed to make this a teachable moment, so I turned to my cousin and explained to him that I didn't have a particular purpose for the condoms (except that at some point they would be used for that which they are meant), I just wanted to be safe, because you never know what's going to happen, and you don't want to find yourself without them when you need them and...

"Please, just stop talking!!!" he pleaded.

"I don't know how!!!" I exclaimed.

It was terrible. And I was sober. I can't count the number of times I've gotten the awkward turtle at alcohol-type parties. I'm pretty sure I had an argument a week ago with a friend about how he met his girlfriend, despite having only met her myself a few hours previous. At Thanksgiving this weekend, some of my family members wished fervently for personal eject buttons after just about every sentence I uttered (although, I think to a certain extent they'd made their beds and I just jumped on them and threw the pillows around, figuratively speaking...they know who they are...).

The point is, I can't stop myself. It's like crack or pizza or Glee. If there's a dime-sized opportunity to be awkward, you can be sure I'll wriggle my fat limbs through like a wharf rat in grocery storage. How do I stop this madness??!?!?!

Hot People Don't Have Bad Hair

I often find myself torn between what is hot NOW and what will make me hot IN THE LONG RUN. My hair seems to have found itself in this sort of epic battle royale at the moment.

My entire life, hair-related angst has sent me into near catatonic states on an extremely regular basis. When it is curly (as it is naturally), I imagine that it kind of resembles an impressionist painting - you know...it looks nice from about ten feet away, but when you get up close to it, it's basically a mess (or at least, that's how Cher Horowitz would describe it). This "mess" problem was mitigated somewhat by the discovery of a $3 curling creme I found at the grocery store that works a ZILLION times better than anything I've ever purchased at a salon (for 5x the price), but when it rains (as it seems to be doing ALL THE TIME these days), it still definitely looks more Claude Monet than John Frieda. The advent of the ceramic straightener was a terrific boon to me. All of a sudden, if nothing else, at least my hair could be hot. Except of course, again, when it rains. Then it just looks like I rolled out of bed and forgot to brush it. At that point, there's really nothing for it except to resort to an "I-give-up" hat or pony-tail holder, lest I be forced to walk around in public looking like Eraserhead.

Much of the art and science of my hair has to do with the cut, and getting a good one isn't easy. My stylist in Halifax was fantastic, but since I don't live there anymore (and neither does he), obviously I can't get cuts from him. Instead, I was referred to the stylist of a friend. This woman works out of her basement. This was obviously my first red flag. The last time I got a haircut in somebody's house it was free and it was done my friend who cut my hair with her kitchen scissors and decided to give me baby bangs without taking into account that they might curl up when my hair dried. The previous time before that, it was for my prom, and the woman curled my hair, then decided one side was longer than the other, so she CUT IT AFTER IT HAD BEEN CURLED to even it out. My experience of home haircuts has been fabulous, you can tell.

Anyway, this woman had a sort of salon in her basement. Her dog kept us company, and she spoke like a sailor. I can see why a spa setting was not a good fit for her. However, the cut she gave me was fabulous, despite my concern about the venue. Truly now, if left to its own devices, or straightened, my hair can certainly add to my hotness (or at least, it is hot on its own).

Unfortunately, there are a number of things that get in the way (yes, that battle royale I referred to in the opening paragraph!).

First of all, I'm pretty sure most hot people are gainfully employed. I'm interning with the food service management of a local hospital. This means I work in a kitchen and consequently wear a hairnet all day. All day. As a result, I seldom bother with my hair because even if it did look fabulous nobody would see it all day. Also, the hairnet has a tendency, by the end of the day, to flatten residual fabulousness so that even seeing people sans 'net after work means my hair won't be amazing. It's a difficult choice to make: continue with an internship that will lead to future employment, or have fabulous hair EVERY SINGLE DAY?

Secondly, hot people are fit (or are, at least, trying to be). I'm still cycling, only now I've parlayed my leisure activity into a handy way to get to work (I say handy...it actually takes me upwards of an hour and a half to commute each way). Unfortunately, I've moved to a city FULL of cyclists, which means that on an almost daily basis I am reminded of how very BAD (read: painfully slow) a cyclist I am. I don't mind it when twenty-somethings zip by me because I assume a. that they have schmancy bikes that I don't have and b. they've been cycling for YEARS and I've only been doing it for a few months after YEARS of neglect, but when OLD MEN are zooming past me I start to feel a little demoralised. However, I press on in the hopes that it will contribute to my goal. But, I find that the combination of bicycle helmet and sweat-inducing cardiovascular activity ALSO results in a coiff that resembles the helmet for hours after its removal. Très chic!

So this is obviously a conundrum that has taken up a significant portion of my thinking time. I think I'll probably stick with being "hot in the long run," but this WILL mean endless complaining about the state of my hair in the meantime. Fair warning.

Hot People Move (or, How I Spent My Summer Vacation): Part 3, Bike

As I'm sure any faithful reader has gathered, I like to cycle, and despite being in the hilly Canadian Shield, I'm finding these hills much more manageable than the ones in New Brunswick that begin at sea level. Again, make no mistake. I am not a "cyclist" (except, of course, when it makes me seem extra heroic or athletic to say so). I don't own any fancy shorts or spandex tops. I can't cycle 100km/d ad nauseom and I don't have one of those super hero-shaped helmets. Mostly, again, I like to go fast...usually downhill, because it's less work that way.

Cycling around here also comes with lots of scenery, and wildlife...especially if you don't mind seeing two-dimensional chipmunks and rabbits (helpfully flattened by the tire of a local F150), with occasional partial internal anatomy, or Jackson Pollock-esque renderings of leopard frogs. Sorry. That was gross.

Anyway, I've been cycling a lot here, training for my 20km commute to work this fall (yay bike paths!) and attempting to undo all the dessert-eating I've been doing with my grandmother. My greatest feat thus far has been a 37km loop. Hardcore cyclists (such as those I allude to in my illustration of the sort of cyclist I am not) will scoff at that, but it's my longest ride to date and I'm proud of it (so nyeah).

It was, however, not without incident. The trip started with some pretty, and familiar scenery. However, just before I turned into new territory, I heard a loud and unfamiliar sound. I soon realized I was being chased by three (rather angry sounding) unleashed dogs who appeared to believe that my ankles looked like they might be tasty. I had to ride for my life, and I outrode them! When I was sure I was not going to be eaten by a pack of rabid dogs (three's a pack, right?), I stopped for a rest and admired this cabbage patch.

I soon turned again into even less familiar territory, at which point the pavement ended. The dirt road that followed seemed to be covered with looser and looser sand...to the point where I amused myself with the notion that I was riding through the Guinness World Record holder for longest outdoor sandbox. Seriously, you could have made some sweet castles with that shit. My amusement was also tempered with the fear that at any moment I would be met by an Ed Gein or Michael Myers lookalike, brandishing a chainsaw, who would drag me to some cabin in the middle of the forest to carry out some sinister and unspeakable deeds on my person. Houses on this road, you see, were few and far between, so only the trees would be able to hear my scream (and, presumably, the rabbits, chipmunks and frogs not yet dispatched by the tire of a pick-up).

Fortunately, I emerged from the forest unscathed to the intersection of Rockingham (I say intersection rather than village or community because it consists of a stop sign and an historic church) From there I continued my thereafter mostly uphill battle (which I gave up on the last leg of the UP). While the view at the top suggested I'd reached lofty heights, the ensuing downhill, though fast, was not as satisfying as I'd hoped, and when I'd reached the last intersection of my trip, (upon which a stand of red pine once stood, until obliterated by the great tornado of aught-seven), my legs were more or less ready to fall off, despite (or perhaps because of) their knowledge that there were only five more or less flat kilometres to go.

Anyway, I reached home with the knowledge that this feat was also achieved...and it feels pretty good to have been a country girl driving on the 401 through Toronto without fear, and to have sailed my grandmother's Laser without falling out or getting stuck in a reef, and to have taken my longest bike-ride ever despite the (real) threat of hungry dogs and the (imagined) threat of chainsaw-wielding homicidal maniacs.

My return to a city (an unfamiliar one) is impending, and if my quest for hotness (I achieved some goals, right? Hot people do that...) seems to be going too successfully, I am sure my new habitat will provide me with plenty of opportunity for blunders and mishaps on the road to being hot. Fear not.

How People Move (or, How I Spent My Summer Vacation): Part 2, Boat

I learned to sail when I was 12 or 13. I am not an expert. At all. I use the boat less as a means to get from point A to point B and more as a way to go fast.

And when I say I learned, please don't misunderstand the method. Most people I know who sail took very expensive lessons at very expensive (I imagine) yacht clubs with guys (I imagine again) named Chad and Landon who are dressed (and coiffed) like the cast of Saved by the Bell when they all worked at Malibu Sands Beach Club, and have hyphenated surnames. I've obviously spent a lot of time considering the sailing lessons of others.

I learned to sail by getting in this boat (which is ancient) and straining to hear by Dad and grandfather screaming from shore for me to "Come about! Come about! Pull on the rope! The other rope! The other, other rope! Go left! Not your left, my left!" and so on.

I've been spending the past three weeks or so (save for my trip to Hamilton) with my grandmother at her cottage. I am the oldest of her grandchildren but we're all really at the age where we have to work through most of the summer, so I think she misses the noise and the company. It's a pity, too, because it's beautiful here, even on freezing cold days such as this one. The result of her relative loneliness is that any time there is a glint of sunlight, it magically becomes "great swimming weather" (my mother and uncles recall a time when this meant all weather save for lightning storms) and any time there is any breath of wind it's "wonderful sailing weather."

The first time she told me this, (which I automatically translate to its true meaning: please go sailing now) it was actually TERRIBLE weather for sailing, unless of course, ones' boat had a motor. I actually tried using the rudder as a propeller (those of you who sail will understand the futility of this measure), lest I get stuck in the middle of the lake.

The next "great sailing weather" day proved more fruitful and was generally a success, in that I went fast, did not fall out of the boat (this has happened to me more times than I care to admit), and managed to steer clear of the lake's numerous booby traps, which include a reef, an old log sticking up out of the water (called, in my family, the dead head), numerous sand bars and cross-breezes, and I learned recently, an old logging crib.

Not bad for someone who learned by straining for poor directions muffled by the wind.

Hot People Move (or, How I Spent My Summer Vacation): Part 1, Car

This is part 1 of a tale of my mastery (?!) of three forms of transportation.

I undertook to travel from rural central Ontario to the great mecca of steel and pollution known as Hamilton to visit one of my oldest friends (and the newest addition to her family). This caused my mother a great deal of stress because rather than using my normal method of complicated pick-ups and drop-offs, depending on the kindness of strangers, with train or bus interludes, I elected this time to rent a car, which meant I would have to drive by myself on the 401 through Toronto. The fact that I maneuvred her car (while she was in it to bear witness) through torrential rains that seemed as though someone was standing on the rof of the car dumping bucket after bucket of water on the windshield (turns out I was driving through a tornado...true story) was of no consequence to her. Nor were my repeated statements that I had driven in Montreal on countless occasions (unless, of course, you can count past two). All she would tell me was that it "wasn't the same."

Well, perhaps I'm foolhardier than most, and perhaps I timed it perfectly to avoid rush hour (more likely), but the trips both there and back were more or less uneventful (Except, of course, for the horrifying experience I had returning the vehicle, in which I uber-failed at backing into a parking space while my Dad watched with an expression of extreme disappointment in my driving skills). The visit was also pleasantly without incident. We ate, watched movies, and I bought this cute jacket for the baby.

...Because hot people buy hot jackets for their hot friends' babies so that they may also, one day, be hot. Incidentally, this picture had the only smile in the bunch, which was unusual for such a smiley baby. As it turned out, he had a diaper-full which when discovered explained the lack of grin. I wasn't grinning either. And, although he was lovely and made me less afraid of babies (since it appeared that simply wrinkling my nose would make him giggle), I also learned that I can certainly survive a few more years without one of my own...unless, of course, they start making odor-free models.

Hot People Road Trip

Uninspired ramblings from my move cross-country.

Stop 1 - 3:59 am AST. Breakfast in Elmsdale. Still dark. So tired. Poured Tim Horton's coffee into the thermos.













Stop 2 - 4:04 am AST. Gas up at Elmsdale Petro-Can (in my head I'm saying Elumsdale). Mysterious 24-hr gas station in the woods with even more mysterious security system. Old bugs washed off windows.










5:11 am AST. Springhill, NS billboard: You should see us now! (What were you like before?!?!)

5:?? am AST. New Brunswick billboard: No small wonders! (or big ones?)

Stop 3 - 6:08 am AST. Gas up in Moncton/Magnetic Hill. CBC reports Stephen Harper eating seal. Bold political move, but no accounting for taste. Sun just coming up. Poured Tim Horton's coffee out of thermos. Into lap.










Stop 4 - 9:53 am AST. Gas up in Edmundston. Jeezly hot. In & out of not quite sleep. Pleased, since I missed most of boring NB TCH.










Stop 5 - 12:09 pm EST. Listening to Dion album. Man, nothing ever goes right for that guy. Driver nearly kills us missing a stop sign at the Laurier Station Ultramar. Getting very hot and very hungry.










3:00 p.m. EST. Discovered Ontario.

Hot People Take it Off and Take Stock

I've been internetless for the better part of a month, so these are catch-up posts - for those interested.

Waxing is nothing, if not a journey of discovery.

All warnings that I would scream out in pain at my first bikini wax were false. While it certainly was not like Christmas morning (except perhaps the one where my parents thought it would be hilarious to stuff my stocking with coal-shaped black licorice - which was quite painful indeed to my four-year old self), it was significantly less painful than I had prepared myself for, although the esthetician did suggest that the services she provided were nothing more than a "good starting point..." (I thought that full pictorial disclosure was not necessary in this case)

The waxing appointment also provided me with the discovery that, despite being appropriately waxed, I am not ready for a bikini. I came to this conclusion whilst sitting, pantsless, on the edge of the spa table wearing a pair of disposable underwear (this is a place I never thought I'd find myself). I was waiting for the esthetician to return with a pot of steaming hot wax, and had time to reflect upon the rolls made by my stomach flubber. When I realized I couldn't tell which roll was hiding my belly button (Now we're ALL glad I decided against pictures, aren't we?), I decided I could compromise with a tankini (obviously, though, with boob support).

I still have some questions about waxing, though. While I understand that it requires maintenance, I'm not sure how much, how often...any suggestions?

More contemplations: I'm moving again...and once again I'm finding myself taking stock of where I am, what I'm leaving behind and where I'm going. Where living in New Brunswick felt like a kind of limbo, this feels like a new beginning. This is good because I don't really feel like I've attained that hotness goal yet (and if hotness is a state of mind, feeling as though I've not succeeded yet must mean I've not succeeded yet).

I guess that since it's been six months since I started this blog, now is as good a time as any to redesign my strategy...so I'll be hot 6 months from now.

No, now.

Ok...NOW!

You get it.