Overheard at Starbucks

Ugh, so I'm at Starbucks in Ossining right now pretending to write a grant proposal. When I found out that this Starbucks makes you fucking pay for wireless, I regrettably paid $9.99 for wireless. I was going to leave to make a statement but I'd already ordered my hot caramel apple cider. And I can't work at home without doing even less than I'm doing nwo. Sigh, I had high hopes for this Starbucks which back in the day experimented with being a groovey coffee shop, a la open mic night. I'm sitting in the back, so at least I only saw one person I know, my brother's friend who I barely recognized.

The only upside to this so-far disappointing experience (other than the hot caramel apple cider) was I watched a woman use her approx. 4 yr old son to try to pick up a guy at Starbucks!
The mother saw me watching and even giggled at me but didn't try to justify herself, so I have to assume what I'm about to describe to you is 100% legit.

Mother: Go tell that guy "My mom likes you" but don't tell him I said to say anything.
Little Pimp: "My mom likes you"
Child runs back
Mother: Ok, now ask him one more question. Say "What are you doing for the rest of your life?'
Little pimp: What are you doing the rest of your life?
Man: Spending it with you.

Aww?

"They must have slept on their Rosie O'Donnell pillows"

Since the runner's up was tied, I'm giving Andrea's vote priority, since she was my only true stalker who voted:

Go back, back, waaay back, before Rosie was the snarky, dykey, speaking her mind and getting publicity View hogging lady she emerged as this year, she was, in popular imagination, "the queen of nice." I have long known she was not as nice as she appears.

The date (according to imdb) was May 19, 1998. As a 13 year old fan of "The Rosie O'Donnell Show" my mom's friend bought me tickets. When she couldn't go, my always punctual father accompanied me and we arrived towards the front of the line. At the very front of the line were three midwestern (non-chicago) looking women who HAD ROSIE O'DOLLS (featured left) ATTACHED TO THEIR HEADS! "Maybe they slept on their Rosie O'Donnell pillows," so snarked our new waiting-on-line friend, bringing you the quote of the day.

Were these overeager Rosie fans rewarded for this? No. The geniuses in the studio seated back to front, meaning me, my dad and our line friends were in the second to last row and the women who may or may not have camped out with their Rosie dolls attached to their heads were seated in the back.

The suckiness continued as Rosie did not speak the the audience AT ALL, shooting koosh balls at the audience only at the end of commercial breaks to try to trick viewers at home, and instead chatting with lame guest Paul Reiser and Kristen Johnston, the tall girl from 3rd Rock from the Sun. And despite guest Natalie Merchant's lovely performance, we did not receive her album but instead received a Funny Lady cd(?)

Rosie has since gained a few points in my book by being a lesbian and more recently telling off Donald Trump. (Another blogger might use this moment to hate on Elisabeth Hasselbeck, and while I don't deny that she sucks, I just can't speak ill of her, since she comes from *my* season of Survivor.) However, I can never truly embrace all that is Rosie because of the way she treated me, and more importantly, the owners of the Rosie O'Dolls.

"Back in the closet, how appropriate!"

Merry Christmas! Here is the story behind the quote you unanimously voted for:

So sophomore year/beginning of junior year of college, post-coming out, I had a few drunken hookups in various stages with boys. I blame alcohol for all of these decisions, but my insightfulness/ability to psychoanalyze myself to death also credits boredom, insecurity, confusion and some other things for these encounters.

At one such occasion sophomore year, I went to a gathering in kto's dorm room and after this dude (a friend of a friend) was shamelessly making out with me in front of everyone, I brought him back to my room in order to avoid the pda i find so repulsive. I would totally kiss and tell, but there's really nothing worth mentioning. After the kid left I went to kto's room to, well, kiss and tell. At that moment of course, said boy calls to say he left a jacket in her room. Instead of just going back to my room, which seems the logical solution in hindsight, kto's idea was that I should hide in her closet when the boy arrived. Which I did.

So that brings you to the quote of the day. I said, "Back in the closet, how appropriate!"

Choose your own adventure!

I had a lovely time today revisiting the East Village (my old home/ favorite place in the city) . And in between hanging out at the bakery with Josh and seeing STOMP! (not so amazing) with mi madre y mi hermano, I went to this Barnes & Nobles in Union Square that had the BEST anti-greeting cards (that I didn't buy because the line was too long and I can't find them online) with sayings like "His worst days are still to come." My favorite said "Nobody read her blog."

That hit a little too close to home. So in order to increase readership/posting, I decided I should allow you to control your destinies. Here are some blog-worthy events in my life from my pre-blogging days. You may have heard some of these stories, which I am identifying by only the date and a quote from the event (mostly NOT attributed to me). You may vote, and I will select the top two vote-getters to blog about. I'm only posting if I have at least 4 distinct commenters (sorry to be so harsh). So if you haven't commented yet, HERE is your chance! Even if you don't know me/do know me and feel like you shouldn't be reading my blog, still post since I am excited to have a quasi-stalker and am probably already reading whatever you put on the internet.

And your choices are:

a) "They must have slept on their Rosie O'Donnell pillows"(1998)
b) "People in Chicago are soooo unsophisticated." (2005)
c) "I thought the gas was the break." (2001)
d) "(inaudible Korean)... teenager" (March 28, 1998)
e) "Never have I ever seen Bill Clinton speak and had to masturbate afterwards"(2004)
f) "It's so annoying that he wo-on" (2000)
g) "Poke him in the eye, poke him in the eye." (1988)
h) "Back in the closet, how appropriate!" (2004)

Now get commenting!

Dear Amazon.com,

How do I fall for your ploys to make me spend more money every time? When you suggest an additional movie I buy it for no other reason then, you're right, the person I am buying the first gift for WOULD enjoy the second that you kindly recommended. And well, with the FREE SUPER SHIPPING, I save, like $3.00, so what's an extra $15 to double the chances that my brother will enjoy his Chanukah present? Amazon.com, you know how to work it. But just know I don't plan on buying any of John Donne's other books. It was for class, dude, a one-time thing.
love, Diana

San Francisco recap

I have ended my 3 month adventure in San Francisco. I'm really happy I went, but not sad to be done though I'll miss the city and the people I met there. And I had a lovely last week with my mom where we ate our way through the bay area and then she packed for me(!). I also had a lovely last night doing my first ever pub crawl in North Beach w/my amazing roommates.

But here, as a Hanukkah present to my hardcore readers, here's an update on some of your favorite SF blog posts:

- I went to Melt!, the coffee shop where I was planning to be a regular, a total of six times. The most recent time Odette (Cornell environmentalist) and I went there, since it's where we met. We remembered why we stopped going. It is INTENSE in there. "Diana!" DeForest cried when I walked in. Everyone wanted to hug us while Odette and I kind of wanted to chat without people trying to enter our conversations. DeForest pretended to cry when I said I was leaving. "I'm going to North Carolina, maybe I'll see you on the east coast," he said. Um, ok. Apparently I am too much of a snob for the Cheers lifestyle.


"That's not sketchy, that's modern": The creepy lesbian sent me this text message: 'I asked santa for a condom, i got 3. I asked for a dollar, i got 10. i asked for a hoe, & i got this number! Lol.' I kind of cut off contact.
The nice lesbians and I played some phone tag but never hung out again. So my romantic life was, duh, nothing, in sf. But katie o was able to convince me during my thanksgiving depression that I will not be alone forever.

I do have a job: While I had so much fun with the other interns, the job got boringer. Rather than going to d.c. my new career goal might entail me spending 2 years in bumblefuck in order to try out newspapers. eek.

Yeah, I met the Cho brothers: My bffs, Erwin and Godwin Cho, lost the Amazing Race, and they kind of didn't deserve to win. I stopped watching, though I've heard the druggie models won.

Pombo kills puppies : Pombo lost in the Democratic sweep of Congress! Yay. I feel I deserve a tiny bit of credit.

And now expect lots of exciting Ossining and Evanston posts. But bye-bye san francisco, i'll miss you. the end.

Back by popular demand

Overheard in the Mr. Smith's (straight bar) bathroom:

Girl #1: Do you think the DJ is gay?
Girl #2: Yeah, obviously.
Girl #1: Oh, because I made out with him.

Editor's note: I don't know if said DJ is gay or straight, but I do know his music sucked.

Freedom of speech, motherf**ker

Since I had NOTHING to do at work, my boss graciously gave me today off. I decided to go explore Berkeley, since it was on my list of things to do before I leave the bay area (in t minus 10 days...insane).

Walking down the street an aging hippie was advertising "subversive" (though not really) pins and buttons with the sign "Freedom of Speech, motherf**ker". I ask, what is the symbolic meaning behind the asteriks? Was this a pointed reminder than there really is no such thing of freedom of speech? Or was the man conceding that it was unnecessary to use the 1st ammendment for the sake of shock value? Or was the hippie just uncomfortable with the word "fuck"?

In other news, I decided to wander onto the campus of UC-Berkeley (or Cal, to locals, which took me like a month here to figure out). It was 3p.m on this beautiful day so students were Since I've been out of the college-bubble for six months, I decided to eavesdrop on what the kids were saying to help me with my return to academia. Here are excerpts from the first four convos I heard after I decided to do this experiment:

Overheard at Cal #1: "A 3.3 is an A-."
Overheard at Cal #2: "Yeah, I try not to highlight everything."
Overheard at Cal #3: "Did you ever find out what happened to that care-package?"

Yup, apparently college students in Berkeley are as dorky as those in Evanston. Thank G-d for "Overheard at Cal #4: "Just because you've been to Tel Aviv doesn't mean you can claim you've been to Israel." While out of context that makes absolutely not sense, since Tel Aviv is obviously in Israel, hey, it's freedom of speech, motherf**ker.