Vimes42 (2:32:43 PM): ..."robot has been identified as a 90 foot version of Brooke Tarnoff of Waltham, who claimed that she was 'still waiting for her damned e-mail', when asked for comment."

It's been an interesting month. And when I say interesting, I mean bad in a crippling way. I misplaced my job a couple weeks ago; I think I left it somewhere in a pile of laundry or possibly in a pile of bad economy. In any case, I was laid off, and the seemingly endless flow of mad cash flows no longer.

I spent a couple days clutching my severence check like a rabid dog (in my teeth, foaming. no, honestly.) and avoiding the television, lest I wake up in three months with cookie crumbs clinging to my lips, mindlessly humming the theme song from Jerry Springer.

In a thrilling blitzkrieg of trauma, my social life chose just then to cough up hairballs. The details are irrelevant -- suffice to say, I spent a number of days sulking and throwing innocent stuffed animals against the walls.

Everything was going wrong. The world had finally given up on subtlety and was flaunting its evil plan to drive me completely mad. I teetered, truly I did. So I had a party.

Okay, technically, I had planned the party long before the cosmos tried to go bad karma on my ass. But I didn't cancel it, though I certainly was tempted, and it was a really, really good decision. It was just the thing to halt the teetering, and it has.

My mother always says things like "close one door and another opens" and "it just takes one thing" (I'm pretty sure that means one small change can alter the current tone of one's life, but what do I know?), and while she sounds suspiciously like a Successories poster, she's probably right. I'm having a seriously great week.

I love old friends and bad movies and good books. I love cartoons and messy people and the smell of clean laundry and sun and cold and reindeer socks.

And I'll get a job, I will. And maybe it will be a job that makes me happy, or at least makes me feel alive. I didn't know how to walk away from the money and the mind-numbage. And then I didn't have a choice. And I have the distinct feeling that I will look back on that, maybe not even so long from now, and thank stars that I missed another bullet.

Friendship is like an ointment
when you've been stung by fifty bees
And wherever you rub it, you know it feels better
because it's a topical analgesic!
-- from the Brak Show

It's true, you know. Sometimes I think my head would fall clean off if it weren't for my friends. Every Sunday, I've been going to Girl Brunch™ with Jess and Kate (my partners-in-crime), and it's been keeping me together. It's good to know that even when everything's going to hell and the world is against us, my soul sisters have always got my back. And I have theirs. I mean it.

Screw with them and I will house you.

They say that what goes around comes around, and for once I think they know what they're talking about.

This morning, I walked into my office building, and not one but TWO elevators opened as I walked up to them. As if that weren't enough, out of elevator-the-first walked my boss's boss, who smiled at me for, like, the 2nd time EVER. The cosmos would have me believe that today is going to be a beautiful day.

I'm skeptical.

Look at me! Look at me! I'm a Lego girl!!

Go ahead, check for accuracy. Then go to http://www.reasonablyclever.com/ and see yourself in plastic.

In my weaker moments, I wonder how we're all supposed to carry on. When I am overworked and overtired, in the slow-motion tilt to sleep, I yield more easily to the nasty little voices I spend my waking days stifling.

What if I lose my job? What if I lose my lease? What if I'm much fatter than I think? What if all stupid people think they're actually smart, and I'm the stupidest of them all?

Most importantly: What if boys are out to get us? They have dark, foreign agendas and threatening desires. Their honest daytime faces hide something twisted and brilliant that would make our hair stand on end if only we knew the truth. But we won't ever know the truth. They're much too crafty.

It's the stuff bad dreams are made of, that last part. My brain collides with the media in a spectacular fireworks extravaganza of anxiety and resignation. It's all too easy to get caught up in popular paranoia when Cosmo and 20th Century Fox churn out an endless stream of "men are from mars, women eat chocolate." They can't slow down. It's a lucrative business, keeping up with the Bridget Joneses.

I can't say I've dated too many men who would quell the fear. I know my share of truly decent and noble boys, and I trust them completely (I hope you know who you are. And if there's anyone out there who's counting himself undeservedly among these ranks, shame on you.), but they are sadly scarce in my life.

And yet I carry on with faith. I blame the arts. I'm reading The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys because I'm a sucker for coming-of-age stories. And even though it's about thirteen year old boys, who are by nature gross little beasts, it's beautiful. Because these gross little beasts are scared and brave and earnest and passionate and hungry and confused. All things that I understand. Chris Fuhrman, the author, seems to believe thirteen year old boys capable of real humanity. And he was a thirteen year old boy. I'll have to take his word for it.

There are just too, too many books and poems and songs written by men who get it just right. Unless my semi-conscious conspiracy theories are somehow correct, they write them because they've felt them. And that's reassuring. Of course, they've all been watching the same stupid movies I have. But the smart ones are out there, filtering through the muck and panning gold. I can tell.

I hope.

Be all that you can be.

That's a moronic sentiment, if I've ever heard one. There are a plethora of excellent reasons not to join the United States Army, the best of which is clearly that idiotic motto.

Honestly, I've seen a wide variety of things I can be if left to my own devices, and I'd prefer to steer clear of them indefinitely. Frankly, I'm not even sure it's possible to be all the things that any given person can be simultaneously.

I've been a lot of admirable things in my time, but I have enduring faith in, at least, my ability to be mean, greedy, careless, irresponsible, ill, unconscious, inept, and a number of other adjectives. And I, for one, don't trust my well-being to a platoon of soldiers expanding the boundaries of the human condition.

Although there is no cure for endometriosis, a variety of treatment options exist. Goals may include: relieving/reducing pain symptoms, shrinking or slowing endometrial growths, preserving or restoring fertility, and preventing/delaying recurrence of the disease.

from the Endometriosis Association

 

This isn't working out so well. I want a do-over.

Now maybe there's a God above, but all I ever learned from love is how to shoot at someone who outdrew you.
And it's no complaint you hear tonight, and it's not some pilgrim who's seen the light –
it's a cold and it's a lonely Hallelujah!

from "Hallelujah" by Leonard Cohen

 

My cat can eat a whole watermelon.

– Rubin Farr (Crispin Glover) in "Rubin and Ed"

I'm not actually apathetic. I'm just kind of dumb. And sort of lazy.

After seeing the umpteenth notable personage clad in a "Free the West Memphis Three" t-shirt, I decided to check out the story on this apparent cause-celebre. Color me much chagrined. This is a cause, celebre or no, that needs a lot more t-shirts.

You're probably not as much of a shiftless layabout as I am. But if you haven't heard this story already, I think it's high time you do. Check it out, and write some letters if you're the type who writes letters. Or maybe even if you're not.

Now, watch that drive.

A couple years ago, Joe and I had a field day modifying nursery rhymes to better suit our peculiar sense(s) of humor. I include my two favorites.

The runner-up:

Jack and Jill went up the hill
to fetch a pail of water.
Jack fell down and broke his crown,
which is primarily defined as"the topmost part of the head or skull."
I can't imagine he survived.

Clearly, the winner:

Little Miss Moffat
sat on a tuffet
eating her curds and whey.
Along came a spider,
and she ate that as well.
Also, the tuffet.

Everyone is afraid of something. My dad hates snakes. My grandmother would rather jump out a window than share company with a mouse. My big brother literally turns blue at the sight of a needle.
Me, I'm afraid of pretty much everything. I don't like heights, fast cars, ants, igniting pilot lights, crawling beasties, or the restaurant Pu Pu Hot Pot. Not a big fan of mimes either.
That being said, nothing will ever scare me as much as water. Simple, refreshing water: it is as familiar as self, quenches my thirst, grows my plants, washes my doggie, and would just as soon kill me as look at me. I try to ignore it: too many people I love want to swim, or sail... or like, drink. And I usually ignore it fairly well. Water is everywhere. I am numb to the pain.
So, I would never turn down a good vacation based on proximity to deep water. Last weekend, I went with Ryan, Jess, and Dan to a cabin (Dan's daddy's cabin, to be specific) in Limerick, Maine. The weather was flawless, the company was perfect, the mosquitoes were affable, and the lake was placid. It even looked welcoming, lapping gently against the shore as though it weren't planning an attack.
We splashed in the shallow water, ate a boatload of cheddar & sour cream potato chips (which are a lot less repulsive than they sound), lolled about, and laughed our heads off at lame in-jokes. It was an uproarious and convivial romp.
<ominous music> No one could have known that doom was on the horizon. </ominous music>
Saturday night, much relaxed and lulled by the wilderness, I suggested an evening ride in the canoe. We set out just before twilight, armed with 99¢ flashlights to guide us back after the sun went down.
We glided through the lake in one boat, perilously low to the surface, but high on camaraderie. We told a ridiculous story (each contributing one line and passing it on, compiling the sad tale of a lonely donkey and his ill-fated love for the fair Mecca-Godzilla) and started singing lots of songs we couldn't be bothered to finish. Everything was perfect.
<ominous music> Too perfect. </ominous music>
We had just decided to turn back when it happened. We spent a few minutes debating the exact location of our cabin and started paddling. A powerboat chose that dark moment to menace its way across the lake, sending our overburdened canoe rolling across the water.
At first, I was merely annoyed. My legs were quite wet. But then my hips were wet as well, and as I mused on the unlikelihood of sitting in a canoe filled with water to the waist, we were already tipping into the pitch black lake.
I can't imagine how I found the wherewithal to catch the flashlight, but it extended just that far, failing to capture my marvelous Target flip-flops, which floated off one by one, lost to me and each other for all time. Jess held onto her flashlight as well, and we trained them on the shore, a staggering 8 million miles from our sad, sodden bodies.
There I was, my skirt floating up around my waist, barefoot, hysterically kicking back the weeds that were almost definitely masking the outstretched fingers of aquatic axe murderers. We hauled the boat and I whimpered feebly, swimming disconsolately, half-ready to give in and let the water just have me, finally. But I hung on, mewling and occasionally blinding Jess with the beam of my flashlight.
They mocked me much less than normal people would have. In fact, they were very understanding. And no one laughed when I hyperventilated, sucking two bugs down my throat. They didn't even laugh when we reached the shore, 5 years later, and I threw up my two bugs while they dragged the boat onto land.
My friends are pretty cool people. We got back to the cabin, Jess made us dessert, and we watched the Blair Witch Project with the lights out. I used to think that movie was pretty scary. This time, it just seemed really dry.

---

Also, today is my birthday. I'm 26. How about that?

---

It is very exciting: my new photogallery site is up and running. It's called photogratify.com. Go there. Submit your photos. God will reward you with his favor.

When you're done with that, go rent the movie Bandits. Hell, go buy it. It's that good.

Oh, and call your mom.

I wanted to write a long, newsy entry today.

It's good to want things.

I am too work-coma to be newsy. Tomorrow, maybe. Today, I will simply tell you that Kirk and Mo had a really very delightful barbeque yesterday, and I will offer as proof the latest photo in the hostile yak series. I think this one is the most hostile yet!

When I was 11, we moved from Mequon, Wisconsin to the suburban wasteland of Warwick, Rhode Island. We left behind the yawning prairie sky, air redolent of growth, the kindness of strangers, and my grandparents. It wasn't until I'd experienced the provinical, insular, badly landscaped fortress of Rhode Island that I was able to appreciate the patchwork ground we crossed on our way out. Conversely, I knew the second we boarded the eastbound train: in leaving my grandparents, I was leaving the most treasured and beautiful part of my childhood behind.

Every morning, my mom and I would drop my brother off at the junior high. We'd spend the remaining hour before my school in McDonald's, crying into our hash browns. Those were the best of times and the worst. My mom will always be my best friend, but those mornings were an incredible and unrepeatable journey, and it was funny and horrible and hard.

There's no definitive end to this story. Eventually we stopped crying in the mornings, and stopped eating Egg McMuffins, because you can't go on living doing either. I made friends, and my mom learned to live halfway across the country from her parents, and we were okay.

And you really can't ever go home again. It's hard to see changes when you count your life in hours and days, but time is a hurricane. Look away for a year, and when you glance back, the landscape is ravished. Mom and I spent the next summer with my grandparents. In the midst of my desperate attempt to recreate my youth, my grandfather had his penultimate stroke, and he was left with a second childhood that he didn't ask for. It would be another few years before the last stroke would put him to rest, and he spent those years sweetly, lovingly, and broken.

I know I can't hold on to them forever, but in the center of my soul, time is standing still. My heart lives in a universe of portraits: my grandma bathing me in the kitchen sink, my dad giving me a sly sip of Heineken on the 4th of July, my mom dancing with my tiny arms around her neck to The Rainbow Connection, my brother giving me airplane rides on the floor of the den, and always, always, my grandfather walking through the door, preceded by the smell of chinese takeout, taking off his coat and calling us to come in and eat.

I love rollercoasters. I really really do. What I don't love is 10 hours on my feet, encased in a prison of sweat.

The thrill of the chafe is gone, and all that's left is the agony of de feet.

Even if the world isn't being washed clean, my old jaded heart still believes that the rain is at least giving it the old college try.

Tonight I took a walk with my senses oversharp. The air is thick, hot, amniotic. It's nights like this — when the atmosphere is insistent, overbearing, tactile — that I am most aware of being alive. I don't mean aware of the act of living, if the act of living can be considered the mental determination to cart the body around. Tonight, I carted without thought and simply was the body.

It's the kind of night that makes melancholy beautiful. When the skin takes over, it wants to feel, connect — but the thirst is as important as the satisfaction. It's heartening to know that in the automatic animal places, I am still reaching out, still believing that connection is possible.

Yesterday, I got to feeling a mite cranky whilst thinking about my cubicle. Really, it's a nice cubicle, as cubicles go, but like everybody else, I never thought I'd be trapped in one. I was supposed be a rock star by now, or the Great American Novelist, or somesuch.

Anyway, I was feeling woefully inadequate all afternoon, so I went home and wrote a song to cheer myself up. It came out a little grim, and a little wry. Wryly grim. Grimly wry. And elsewise.

Here are the lyrics:

I had a dream last night
and you were in it
you stuck a knife through my hand
told me to "hold this a minute"

I bled from the palms and
we talked about issues
you said "I'm more likely to love
the kind of girl who does dishes"

so I took out the knife
and I washed it for you
after all that I've done
it was the least I could do

it's the least I can do

It's a beautiful day here on the floor seven, with the window open and the plastic Britney chair gleaming wickedly in the sunlight. I have a flowering branch taped to my monitor and iTunes is playing "Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard." I know I shouldn't sing along, but I'm having a hard time remembering why. It feels like summer vacation for no apparent reason.

I'm suddenly flooded with gratitude for having a job that can ever seem like summer vacation for no apparent reason. Part of me wants to run to the elevator and skatebikedancefly around the free world, but part of me is perfectly content to sit here at my desk, making lazy half circles with my rolly chair, listening to good music and not doing work.

When I was a little girl (for many years, until I wasn't so little) there was one place in a succession of family homes where I spent most of my time. Every moment not spent eating dinner, doing homework (few such moments), or watching a pittance of television was spent there. Everything that normal kids did in their bedrooms, I did in the bedroom closet.

Mindful of this, my parents gave me a palatial walk-in when we built our house in Rhode Island when I was twelve. That closet comfortably housed me, my toys, a couple hundred books (Sweet Valley High, Nancy Drew, Baby-Sitters Club, etc.), wall-to-wall carpeting, and a boatload of clothes. I'd spend hours closed inside -- reading, playing, daydreaming. When I got older, I dragged the phone in, for a sacred extra wall of teenaged isolation.

I don't know what I thought I was hiding from. Save for a couple months of thorny relations during the monstrosity that is 15-year-old-girlhood, I've always gotten on famously with my parents. (I'm sure you've heard about it -- it's famous.) There was nothing to retreat from and nothing to hide (Except the fact that I still played with Barbies in the 8th grade, which is shameful indeed, but my parents already know. And now you do too. Shut your face.)

I think it's simply that I've always required more personal space than the average bear. And perhaps also have a penchant for small, enclosed spaces.

I was cured of my addiction upon our move to Baltimore, where we lived in a brownstone in the city. The house was very old and queerly built, and virtually every room was set up as a master bedroom. Mine was big and sqaure, with a connecting bathroom and three (THREE!) adjoining walk-in closets. The combined space of the closets (which had doorframes but no doors to close off from each other) was as large as my first childhood bedroom. The womblike calm of closets past was but a memory. Add to that: the complete social isolation of art school and the resulting desperate need for interaction with my family in the evening.

It was the end of my long love affair with closets.

In any case, I should take a lesson from my childhood and understand why I get so weird when i don't have enough time to myself. History tells me I am a cave-dwelling creature of solitude. Like a bat.

quoth besty-the-first:

ninjakittens: "i'm bleeding but boy he's cute"

okay, she was talking about her cat at the time. but holy crow. i hear that.

I AM:

• glad it's Tuesday, on account of my programs
• sort of jittery, for no apparent reason
• wearing a crewneck t-shirt, possibly for the first time ever (not counting gym and bed)
• sad for Lauren, who is getting reamed by the auto repair shop
• excited about my upcoming weekend trip to Baltimore

I HAVE:

• cold hands
• a sense of peace when friendships are rekindled. or rekindeled
• a number of really gorgeous new shoes (that number, conveniently, being a multiple of two)
• a good hair day

I WANT:

• something exciting to happen, in a good way

A Sad Story:

Once upon a time, there was an eighteen year old girl who wanted to start over. She could count her friends on one hand, and she was tired of being alone.

She went to college and her only real friend from home came with her. He lived on a hall with a very dirty boy who did a lot of drugs and was smart and tough.  The dirty boy took shit from no one. No one.  

He was a genius.  He was a photographer. He had a terrible nose and he was beautiful.

The girl ditched her best friend who took shit from everyone.  The girl endeavored to worship the dirty boy until he would take her childhood away.  Instead, he took her for a drive.

She'll never really know if it was really an accident.  She'll never know exactly how it happened, but he kissed her and asked her to go for a ride and she would never have dreamed of saying no.

They drove around for about an hour and headed home.  The girl was dizzy with belonging, feeling for the first time in her life like a rebel. 

They made a few stops.  The boy got a speeding ticket.  It wasn't a warning. It was 95 in a 55 zone and it didn't slow him down a bit.  The girl didn't think that was love, but she didn't want to say anything in case she was wrong.

They were 30 seconds from the parking lot.  She was thinking about how late it was, how the next morning at 7 she would report to dining services for her first day of work.  She was thinking about grey uniform shirts when she saw the wall coming in at the wrong angle. She said "no" and thought one last time of grey shirts and died.

No, she didn't die. She awoke seconds or minutes later to the sound of the boy screaming her name.  His voice was cracking, breaking. She said,"I'm okay, I'm okay." And looked down. "Oh." Held up her red hand. "I'm bleeding."

Her shoes were gone.  Her glasses were gone.  There was glass in her tongue.

In the ambulance, asked the EMT if she would die.  She couldn't feel her legs.  Her hands were in strips. "I don't know," he said. "We haven't seen the doctor yet."

The doctor said she wouldn't die, but should've.  He should have said "could've," she realized.  Maybe he had.  Maybe she'd heard wrong.

The police said should've. "I was only a passenger," she wanted to beg him. He said, clearly, "Should have died."

Everyone wondered why they'd flown off a wall and into another.  Everyone wondered where the girl's mouth had been.

The girl thought she was already dead.  The girl knew her last thought was of the dining hall at 7 AM. The girl wanted her mom but wasn't sure she still had one.

She went home soon and she found someone who would carry her across campus to the dirty boy's room.  He took her into his bed and kept her there for two days, bringing her food. Soon her body broke down.  She had a temperature of 106, then 104, which lasted for days.  Her parents came to take her back to the hospital. She was badly bruised, and the mother tried not to scream when she saw her girl. 

The girl had never been so ugly.

Sympathy lasted for the duration of the fever.  "I know you were scared," her friends said, "but you didn't die.  You have to let go."

She relived the accident every night in her sleep.  She died thinking of uniforms. She never cried "Mommy!" She cried, "Wall!"

The dirty boy was the only one who'd been there. "I love you," he said, "and I know what the wall looked like from 2 inches away.  I know what you looked like unconscious.  I thought you were dead."

"So did I," she said, but what she meant was, "I still do."

And everyone moved on, and the dramas changed before her bruises had even faded, and every night she died thinking of grey.

And the horrible dirty boy was the only one who'd been there.

Spring has sprung. The grass has riz! I wonder where my air-conditioner is.

92 degrees in the middle of April! Oh, for the love of Mike.

Reason #412 that I love Lauren Razzore:

Last night, we had front row seats to Puccini's La Fanciulla del West. When it was over, Lauren casually mentioned her brave struggle to avoid leaning against a crack in the orchestra pit wall and whispering to an unaware and mustachioed trombonist, "You're ruining it for everyone."

That's my girl.

Lauren, Todd, and I had a bit of a field day in the Victory with Jamie's camcorder. See for yourself.

Scary Brooke
Estrogen

Says Joe to Brooke: "You make me smile. I *hate* you."

(Joe has a new cartoon that is both funny and nonsensical in that it invokes a reaction of laughter and makes little sense.)

In the almost-month since I've written, too many ideas have slipped by in their little black ninja robes. I'm not sure if I could catch up if I wanted to -- I can recall having a number of conversations entitled (for production purposes only) "I Should Write About That In My Journal Today!" but I'm pretty sketchy on the details. I think the best I can do is offer some pictures of the last party and start clean.

Today is a funny day. Yesterday was 60 degrees and springsome, and I was feeling pretty great about that. (I like Tuesdays. My programs are on.) But today, a mere 24 hours later, the snow is coming down like god went to a Jersey mall with all of his friends and they're finally brushing out the hairspray. I'm not unhappy about it at all. I think El Niño's a good kid (except for all the dead plankton). Maybe if the snow is sticky, I'll make a Snow Chicken on my front lawn.

This weather always reminds me of being a little kid. I don't know if that's because I'm from the midwest, or if snow makes everyone feel insulated and enfolded. I want to wrap myself in footie pajamas and my great grandma's afghan, and drink cocoa, and watch The Neverending Story with every single light in the house turned on.

I'm having company over for dinner, but I can't imagine anyone would begrudge me my jammies. Right?

I think I'm coming down with something. My head is all thick and my dose is a liddle sduffy. And no one seems to know that I don't like chocolate. So I'm kind of cranky. But it's okay.

On Tuesday night, I went to a karaoke bar in JP with Lauren, Todd, and Pete. None of us sang, and the music ranged from hilarious to stomach-turning (with a few gems thrown in), but it was the most fun ever. I got all beer-silly and shook my groovething as though I were a preteen hopped up on candy at a slumber party. While I am always at home letting my voice carry, I lack the self-confidence to overtly display my corporeity in public very often... I experienced considerable morning-after I-did-WHAT?!ness, but I have to admit it felt really good to just let go.

And next Tuesday, they're having a karaoke prom.

We're so there.

Hennessey the Godlike Hedgehorse

One day, little Timmy was playing with matches in his backyard when he caught a flash of vibrant blue out of the corner of his eye. Setting the matches down and stumbling away from the blaze, Timmy set after the fleeting glow like a thirsty pony.

It was hard to follow, because it moved so fast -- he would see a quick burst of color in the distance and race to meet it, only to find that it had disappeared, and just as he was about to give up and walk back to the remains of his house, he would catch another sudden spark of blue just past his sightline.

If Timmy's field of vision was a city, the shimmering blue was hovering around the suburbs, window shopping while Timmy gave chase. Or, more likely, the opposite was true, and little Timmy was the rube audience to the neoteric foxtrot of the orb. In the blossoming wisdom of his six years, Timmy was beginning to feel that he was out-matched by the glowing blue.

After nearly an hour of sundog-and-mouse, Timmy had chased his way into a clearing a good way from home. He found the blue glow arcing back and forth above his little head, as though it were waiting for him. Its trajectory was buzzingly fast, but each time it neared the center of the curve, it would momentarily slow its pace. When it lagged, Timmy squinted up at it, able briefly to discern a faint shape within the quivering rays of light. He could see what appeared to be a spikey, spiney mammalian back, and Timmy was just about to set off running when the glow stopped glowing and descended to the grass, solid and corporeal.

There was a moment of silence, during which time Timmy felt himself grounded in the thickish ink gaze of the thing. The bodies regarded each other, the no-longer-lucent creature looking unimpressed by his observations. Timmy, on the other hand, was extremely impressed, having never seen such an animal -- one with a squat and heavily spoked brown body, small and protective in posture. The face was equine -- large, smooth and stoic.

The thing spoke first. "I am a hedgehorse," it said with an air of finality, as though this revelation were the beginning, middle, and end of any story worth telling.

The future is now. Well, the future was last night. Now it's post-future. Just call me Mad Maxbrooke.

So, Lauren and I had an after new year's new year's party last night, and in its memory, we shall dedicate a joint journal entry, commencing in 3...2...1...

BAM.

Lauren: There were hijinks better left unsaid last night.
Brooke: Tr00. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Get it?
Lauren: The only thing that remains is our temporary tattoos, and a hangover.
Brooke: I have no hangover, but I do have an extra tattoo that someone (not naming any names, Lauren) slapped on my knee while I was sitting on the stairs. Lauren.
Lauren: I don't even have the brain cells to respond, my head hurts too much.
Brooke: That's okay, I'm kind of stupid anyway. Should we just show the pretty pictures?
Lauren: Yes, I think so, and then go get grease somewhere.
Brooke: Oh, darling. Grease I can do. Here are the pretty pictures. They are lessons about what happens when you give little girls too much to drink.
Lauren: When good girls go bad.
Brooke: Huzzah.