In the midst of all this financial crisis doom & gloom, I feel strangely cheerful and a bit like the title character Annie, who advises the residents of Hooverville to look on the bright side - “So you don’t have any money? You don’t have to pay any income tax!” It’s actually fun to realize how much better off I am than those suffering hedge fund managers and investment bankers who have lost millions and had to cancel orders for private planes.
I was broke BEFORE the economic crisis, so it didn’t really affect me, and I don’t have any investments to lose value; frankly, the only change I’ve noticed lately is that gas is under $4 a gallon again, which makes me less nauseous every time I have to fill up my minivan (which I couldn’t afford to replace with a Prius even before the market fell).
Then there are the suddenly budget-conscious parents dealing with teens whining, “What do you mean, we can’t afford to buy eight new outfits at Abercrombie?” We’ve never been able to shop anywhere but Target or Old Navy, so my sons aren’t experiencing any sense of loss and are considerably happier than their more well-off classmates. (Plus my boys think wearing designer label logos is ridiculous - why should they pay to be human billboards?)
Marriages are collapsing as couples deal with financial stress for the first time. Fortunately, my husband & I were broke when we got married, so we already knew how to cope with budget worries and spending limits. (I’m a songwriter, he’s a singer studying to be a rehab counselor, so as you can see we married each other for our money. . . . )
Homeowners are panicking as their mortgages balloon, and housing prices fall below the ridiculously inflated prices to only somewhat inflated prices. For those of us who are renters, it just means our landlords can’t afford to sell the house, so we have a little more peace of mind.
Of course, I’m sure the crisis will affect me someday, perhaps in higher food costs or reduced freelance opportunities. But the biggest negative result I’ve noticed is that suddenly there are all these hedge fund managers in designer clothes wandering around Target . . .
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Let gay couples have a chance for lousy marriages too!
California is often called the ‘granola state’ (the land of flakes and nuts), but we’re also ahead of the game on many social issues, from motion pictures to medicinal marijuana use to allowing right turns on red lights. That’s why I’m so dismayed that we have a proposition on the ballot to eliminate gay marriage - honestly, aren’t we a bit more progressive than Massachusetts? Or Canada?
I frankly don’t understand how allowing Andy & Bob to stay married hurts my heterosexual marriage or makes it less sacred. Frankly, the issue of gay marriage is responsible for my being married in the first place - I was a single mom with a commitment-phobic boyfriend, who loved giving me the ‘what difference does a piece of paper make’ speech. I pointed out how much our many gay friends had spent to get a fraction of the legal protections we could get for a single trip to City Hall, and he willingly took on marriage (and two stepsons!)
As for the sanctity of the marital relationship, male/female couples have done more than enough to destroy it (in the Spears family alone!) My remaining faith in traditional marriage was obliterated once Madonna & Guy Ritchie announced their divorce - I really thought they’d last (at least it was longer than her marriage to Sean Penn, but that's not saying much). Our divorce rate is quite high, and one look at the tabloids is enough to wonder if gay couples can do a bit better . . .
If marriage really is just about procreation, I guess that means that couples not planning on having kids (or too old to procreate) shouldn’t be allowed to marry either - which would’ve cut me out. (I was 45 when I remarried, and as much as I admire older moms, there’s no WAY I was going back to diapers until I need them myself!)
And with the current fiscal crisis, gay marriage would provide the economic stimulus we need - what a boon for wedding venues, florists, musicians, religious facilities, caterers, gift registries, and, down the road, divorce lawyers! California’s economy is already in the dumps - invalidating gay marriage would hurt tourism (as long as the rest of the country lags behind us).
Finally, do we really want California to follow the rest of the country? Come on, people, we’re better than that. No offense to the other 49 states, but face it, we've led the way on every issue from drive-through banking to right turn on red. We have to defend our reputation as the real mavericks!
I frankly don’t understand how allowing Andy & Bob to stay married hurts my heterosexual marriage or makes it less sacred. Frankly, the issue of gay marriage is responsible for my being married in the first place - I was a single mom with a commitment-phobic boyfriend, who loved giving me the ‘what difference does a piece of paper make’ speech. I pointed out how much our many gay friends had spent to get a fraction of the legal protections we could get for a single trip to City Hall, and he willingly took on marriage (and two stepsons!)
As for the sanctity of the marital relationship, male/female couples have done more than enough to destroy it (in the Spears family alone!) My remaining faith in traditional marriage was obliterated once Madonna & Guy Ritchie announced their divorce - I really thought they’d last (at least it was longer than her marriage to Sean Penn, but that's not saying much). Our divorce rate is quite high, and one look at the tabloids is enough to wonder if gay couples can do a bit better . . .
If marriage really is just about procreation, I guess that means that couples not planning on having kids (or too old to procreate) shouldn’t be allowed to marry either - which would’ve cut me out. (I was 45 when I remarried, and as much as I admire older moms, there’s no WAY I was going back to diapers until I need them myself!)
And with the current fiscal crisis, gay marriage would provide the economic stimulus we need - what a boon for wedding venues, florists, musicians, religious facilities, caterers, gift registries, and, down the road, divorce lawyers! California’s economy is already in the dumps - invalidating gay marriage would hurt tourism (as long as the rest of the country lags behind us).
Finally, do we really want California to follow the rest of the country? Come on, people, we’re better than that. No offense to the other 49 states, but face it, we've led the way on every issue from drive-through banking to right turn on red. We have to defend our reputation as the real mavericks!
Friday, October 10, 2008
New To YouTube
It's not hard for me to feel behind-the-times, what with two sons (12 and 15), a computer I don't understand, and technological innovations coming at us at record speeds. But nothing has confused me more than internet-based social networking, sites like Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, etc. On top of not really understanding how to use them, I find myself wondering how people have time to do anything else, they seem to be spending so much of their lives creating, maintaining, and updating their pages and commenting on everyone else's. So their updates tend to be self-referential - you can look on a Facebook page and learn "I'm currently updating my Facebook page". I'd rather sleep . . . .
Every now and then, one of my boys will show me what he thinks is a hysterical YouTube video (which usually involves inappropriate humor or some random guy dancing like an idiot). I don't usually get the jokes, but I am bewildered, and somewhat weirdly impressed, by the effort that goes into these works of - not creativity, but at least self-expression. I never thought I'd join the throng, but a combination of events, what my woo-woo friends call synchronicity, got me on board. 1) With my hair up and my glasses on, people keep telling me I look like a certain formerly-anonymous-yet-suddenly-universally-famous-Alaskan-governor. 2) Watching said governor's performance in the VP debate had me fuming, and itching to do something. 3) My 12-year-old came home from helping a neighbor clean out a garage,having been rewarded with the head from an old life-sized moose costume. When weird events like these coincide, there is no alternative but to write, film and post a youTube song parody about Sarah Palin. So I did.
Now I've used YouTube before, in an attempt at self-promotion, posting demo videos and clips from my live shows. And it's been helpful, in that I can email potential clients a link to the clips, rather than having to send DVD demos at eight bucks a pop plus postage. But those videos couldn't compete with 'weird guy dancing' or 'frat boys throwing up', so I was getting used to, oh, 15-30 hits for each. However, the Palin video must have hit a nerve, because as of this moment (6:30 p.m., PST, Friday) I'm up to 1,117 hits, and it just keeps spreading. Total strangers are emailing me saying they liked it, and suggesting places to post it.
This may all blow over soon, or it might lead to being discovered somehow and becoming an overnight success after 28 years, who knows. But in the meantime, it's fun to play with (I learned you can post text on videos, in cartoon-like balloons!), and now I'm giving those crazy dancing frat boys a run for their money. If nothing else, I finally found something to do with the stupid moosehead - and I'm much less angry about Palin now that I'm reaping some rewards and having so much fun!
Every now and then, one of my boys will show me what he thinks is a hysterical YouTube video (which usually involves inappropriate humor or some random guy dancing like an idiot). I don't usually get the jokes, but I am bewildered, and somewhat weirdly impressed, by the effort that goes into these works of - not creativity, but at least self-expression. I never thought I'd join the throng, but a combination of events, what my woo-woo friends call synchronicity, got me on board. 1) With my hair up and my glasses on, people keep telling me I look like a certain formerly-anonymous-yet-suddenly-universally-famous-Alaskan-governor. 2) Watching said governor's performance in the VP debate had me fuming, and itching to do something. 3) My 12-year-old came home from helping a neighbor clean out a garage,having been rewarded with the head from an old life-sized moose costume. When weird events like these coincide, there is no alternative but to write, film and post a youTube song parody about Sarah Palin. So I did.
Now I've used YouTube before, in an attempt at self-promotion, posting demo videos and clips from my live shows. And it's been helpful, in that I can email potential clients a link to the clips, rather than having to send DVD demos at eight bucks a pop plus postage. But those videos couldn't compete with 'weird guy dancing' or 'frat boys throwing up', so I was getting used to, oh, 15-30 hits for each. However, the Palin video must have hit a nerve, because as of this moment (6:30 p.m., PST, Friday) I'm up to 1,117 hits, and it just keeps spreading. Total strangers are emailing me saying they liked it, and suggesting places to post it.
This may all blow over soon, or it might lead to being discovered somehow and becoming an overnight success after 28 years, who knows. But in the meantime, it's fun to play with (I learned you can post text on videos, in cartoon-like balloons!), and now I'm giving those crazy dancing frat boys a run for their money. If nothing else, I finally found something to do with the stupid moosehead - and I'm much less angry about Palin now that I'm reaping some rewards and having so much fun!
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Benefits of Aging
I'm heading rapidly toward the big 5-0, and while everyone says 'age is just a state of mind', there are unpleasant physical ramifications, too!, from creaky knees to a sagging jaw line. I've discovered that when I smile, it lifts my cheeks enough to prevent me from looking like a jowly Marlon Brando (which explains why I look so weirdly cheerful all the time!) - but I've also decided it's time to try to find the positive aspects of aging.
1) You're more comfortable in your skin - granted, because said skin is considerably looser, but oh well, looser is more comfortable!
2) You start tuning out those judgmental voices in your head, what therapists call 'negative self-talk' or 'inner critic', or what my friend Danielle calls 'Radio K-FUC', or what I call my most recent phone call from my mother.
3) You care less about what other people think. (One day at school pick-up, I was wearing my typical loud bright colors, talking to a group of 4 women all of whom were in dark, dull tops, khaki pants and flipflops. One of them sniped, "Gee, Lauren, I need sunglasses to look at you today", and without thinking I quipped, "Well, I guess I didn't get the wardrobe memo." And it felt good!)
4) You realize that growing older beats the alternative.
1) You're more comfortable in your skin - granted, because said skin is considerably looser, but oh well, looser is more comfortable!
2) You start tuning out those judgmental voices in your head, what therapists call 'negative self-talk' or 'inner critic', or what my friend Danielle calls 'Radio K-FUC', or what I call my most recent phone call from my mother.
3) You care less about what other people think. (One day at school pick-up, I was wearing my typical loud bright colors, talking to a group of 4 women all of whom were in dark, dull tops, khaki pants and flipflops. One of them sniped, "Gee, Lauren, I need sunglasses to look at you today", and without thinking I quipped, "Well, I guess I didn't get the wardrobe memo." And it felt good!)
4) You realize that growing older beats the alternative.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Yee Haw - County Fairs in the suburbs?
Last month, I achieved a career milestone; I got invited to perform at the San Mateo County Fair. It was pretty exciting, even though I wasn't on the headliner stage, which was reserved for the really big name acts - like Billy Ray Cyrus and The Village People. But it was thrilling to see myself listed in the ads (the small print section, "Plaza Stage Acts, featuring The Lucho Libre Masked Mud Wrestlers, Harold the Hip Hypnotist, and Others"; yep, that was me, "Others"!)
Then I got my confirmation letter, directing me to report to the stage immediately adjacent to the pig races. Hmmm . . . . I didn't realize anyone here in the 'burbs raced pigs. (Frankly, the closest any of us come to agriculture is going to Half Moon Bay to pick out halloween pumpkins, so the whole idea of a suburban county fair seemed sort of crazy to begin with.) But pig races are even popular here - When I got to the fair, I saw that my stage and the racetrack shared a set of bleachers, which were packed for the race before my set. (It looked like a close one between "Natalie Porkman" and "Kevin Bacon", but the surprise winner by a nose - by a snout? - was "Lindsay Loham".) Whatever, the crowd was all fired up, but then right before I went on, they announced that Lindsay Loham's mother was over in the livestock tent giving birth, so naturally the bleachers emptied.
I can't compete with a baby pig - I ended up doing my set for my family, a couple of truly saintly friends, the hypnotist's dad (who got the times wrong but didn't want to hurt my feelings), and a mom with a large brood of kids. I figured, well, she's a fan and a mom and obviously needs the entertainment, but apparently, no, she just needed a place for them all to sit down while she nursed her youngest. Very openly. In fact, my two teenage sons couldn't tell you a thing about my set . . . or in their words, that's not the set they were watching. But in fact they want to go back to the county fair every year, they found it so educational!, and meanwhile, if I ever get a swelled head, just direct me to the bleachers by the pig races . . . .
Then I got my confirmation letter, directing me to report to the stage immediately adjacent to the pig races. Hmmm . . . . I didn't realize anyone here in the 'burbs raced pigs. (Frankly, the closest any of us come to agriculture is going to Half Moon Bay to pick out halloween pumpkins, so the whole idea of a suburban county fair seemed sort of crazy to begin with.) But pig races are even popular here - When I got to the fair, I saw that my stage and the racetrack shared a set of bleachers, which were packed for the race before my set. (It looked like a close one between "Natalie Porkman" and "Kevin Bacon", but the surprise winner by a nose - by a snout? - was "Lindsay Loham".) Whatever, the crowd was all fired up, but then right before I went on, they announced that Lindsay Loham's mother was over in the livestock tent giving birth, so naturally the bleachers emptied.
I can't compete with a baby pig - I ended up doing my set for my family, a couple of truly saintly friends, the hypnotist's dad (who got the times wrong but didn't want to hurt my feelings), and a mom with a large brood of kids. I figured, well, she's a fan and a mom and obviously needs the entertainment, but apparently, no, she just needed a place for them all to sit down while she nursed her youngest. Very openly. In fact, my two teenage sons couldn't tell you a thing about my set . . . or in their words, that's not the set they were watching. But in fact they want to go back to the county fair every year, they found it so educational!, and meanwhile, if I ever get a swelled head, just direct me to the bleachers by the pig races . . . .
Monday, April 28, 2008
The Secret is 'out'
I hate to admit it, but every now and then I have a serious case of schadenfreude (taking pleasure in others' misfortunes), but only in the sense of delighting when someone or something overblown gets taken down a peg. (Like seeing that ostensibly perfect mom, the immaculately coiffed one whose whole-grain fed kids behave so perfectly, losing it and screaming at her kids in McDonalds'.) So imagine my delight when I read that the various co-creators of The Secret are at each others' throats in court!
I don't claim that positive thinking has no value, but I was always struck by the hypocrisy of Rhonda Byrne, The Secret's author, who claimed that she wasn't interested in profit, she just wanted to get the effectiveness of positive thinking out to the world. If it was really so effective, couldn't she just have visualized us all getting it, and saved everyone the $19.95 (or $29.95 for the DVD)? However, apparently she has now formed a production company, which is suing the web developer for infringing on their proprietary rights, and meanwhile the DVD producer with whom she developed the original concept is suing her for not making good on their original agreement to split the profits. It's all a bunch of complicated legal tussling over profit-sharing, copyright ownership, and employment versus independent contracting - basically fighting over the enormous income stream that has been generated by a philosophy that stresses gratitude, integrity, and generosity.
I was always a bit skeptical of anyone insisting that I just had to visualize a BMW in my driveway to manifest it - I was more interested in manifesting a clean family room and a tank of gas for less than $60. But now my skepticism has been vindicated by such delicious evidence of the underlying hypocrisy. Although who knows - maybe the lawsuits prove The Secret after all, and a bunch of lawyers visualized - then manifested - the most lucrative lawsuit they could imagine!
I don't claim that positive thinking has no value, but I was always struck by the hypocrisy of Rhonda Byrne, The Secret's author, who claimed that she wasn't interested in profit, she just wanted to get the effectiveness of positive thinking out to the world. If it was really so effective, couldn't she just have visualized us all getting it, and saved everyone the $19.95 (or $29.95 for the DVD)? However, apparently she has now formed a production company, which is suing the web developer for infringing on their proprietary rights, and meanwhile the DVD producer with whom she developed the original concept is suing her for not making good on their original agreement to split the profits. It's all a bunch of complicated legal tussling over profit-sharing, copyright ownership, and employment versus independent contracting - basically fighting over the enormous income stream that has been generated by a philosophy that stresses gratitude, integrity, and generosity.
I was always a bit skeptical of anyone insisting that I just had to visualize a BMW in my driveway to manifest it - I was more interested in manifesting a clean family room and a tank of gas for less than $60. But now my skepticism has been vindicated by such delicious evidence of the underlying hypocrisy. Although who knows - maybe the lawsuits prove The Secret after all, and a bunch of lawyers visualized - then manifested - the most lucrative lawsuit they could imagine!
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Family Movie Night
Life with boys is not what I expected when I decided to become a mom - sure, I knew I couldn't choose my kids' gender, but I was convinced I could raise my kids in a neutral way AND fulfill my maternal fantasies. So I couldn't frenchbraid their hair, but I could read them the Little House books - wrong, they preferred Captain Underpants. I bought them dolls and stuffed animals - they used the toys as guns. I'm gradually learning it's hard-wired, no matter how hard I try.
And it's not like ours is a macho, athletic household. My kids don't know anything about sports - we won box seats to a Giants' game, and they were more interested in the cotton-candy vendor than the action. (Other than Ben noticing a typical Barry Bonds move, not really hustling to run for a potential single, and very loudly he piped up, "That guy there isn't very good!") Ben takes drum lessons, David does theater and takes dance class, but they still have a boys' sense of humor, no matter how hard I try to be a civilizing influence. For example, David has invented a game where he tacks on an inappropriate phrase to the end of the title of songs from musicals. (His current favorite is adding " . . . in my pants" to classic musicals like Damn Yankees, so you get "Whatever Lola Wants, Lola Gets . . . in my pants", and so on.) (Okay, I shouldn't laugh, but I've got to give him credit for an originality!)
Our recent family movie night was a great illustration of life in a boy-dominated household. We couldn’t agree which t.v. movie to watch, because I wanted Steel Magnolias (southern women bonding in the beauty parlor with great sarcastic oneliners!), but the boys preferred Alien Resurrection (the REALLY violent one in the series, where a cloned Sigourney Weaver gives birth to the ultimate monster child, and saves the world with Winona Ryder as an android). We ended up compromising by flipping back & forth between the two, which produced a hybrid I called "Magnolia Resurrection" -
"Ripley? You’re alive? I guess this means I’ll have to kill you."
"If you can’t say anything nice about anyone, come sit next to me!"
"Keep away from me, you disgusting slimy alien ."
"Ewww, that woman needs some serious lycra on those thighs . . . . "
"What are we gonna do? The aliens are escaping!"
"That boy is so confused he don’t know whether to scratch his watch or wind his butt!"
I decided to put the movie hybrid idea into my comedy show, but when I told the boys they immediately corrected me and said, "No, mom, what would be really funny is a movie called 'Alien Erection'. . . .". (I'll leave the ensuring gestures and sound effects to your imagination.) Meanwhile, I'm going to go re-read Little Women and see if the neighbor's daughter will let me do her hair . . . .
And it's not like ours is a macho, athletic household. My kids don't know anything about sports - we won box seats to a Giants' game, and they were more interested in the cotton-candy vendor than the action. (Other than Ben noticing a typical Barry Bonds move, not really hustling to run for a potential single, and very loudly he piped up, "That guy there isn't very good!") Ben takes drum lessons, David does theater and takes dance class, but they still have a boys' sense of humor, no matter how hard I try to be a civilizing influence. For example, David has invented a game where he tacks on an inappropriate phrase to the end of the title of songs from musicals. (His current favorite is adding " . . . in my pants" to classic musicals like Damn Yankees, so you get "Whatever Lola Wants, Lola Gets . . . in my pants", and so on.) (Okay, I shouldn't laugh, but I've got to give him credit for an originality!)
Our recent family movie night was a great illustration of life in a boy-dominated household. We couldn’t agree which t.v. movie to watch, because I wanted Steel Magnolias (southern women bonding in the beauty parlor with great sarcastic oneliners!), but the boys preferred Alien Resurrection (the REALLY violent one in the series, where a cloned Sigourney Weaver gives birth to the ultimate monster child, and saves the world with Winona Ryder as an android). We ended up compromising by flipping back & forth between the two, which produced a hybrid I called "Magnolia Resurrection" -
"Ripley? You’re alive? I guess this means I’ll have to kill you."
"If you can’t say anything nice about anyone, come sit next to me!"
"Keep away from me, you disgusting slimy alien ."
"Ewww, that woman needs some serious lycra on those thighs . . . . "
"What are we gonna do? The aliens are escaping!"
"That boy is so confused he don’t know whether to scratch his watch or wind his butt!"
I decided to put the movie hybrid idea into my comedy show, but when I told the boys they immediately corrected me and said, "No, mom, what would be really funny is a movie called 'Alien Erection'. . . .". (I'll leave the ensuring gestures and sound effects to your imagination.) Meanwhile, I'm going to go re-read Little Women and see if the neighbor's daughter will let me do her hair . . . .
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