I was watching the Canadian election coverage last night and saw an interview with a newly elected Conservative Member of Parliament who the commentator said would likely be the next minister of international affairs.

"Irregardless..." she began.

I twitched at the word, which doesn't freaking exist and thought, "Dear God. Our country is screwed."

And then I had a brain wave: Maybe she will be able to speak with Dubya in his own language! Cross-border relations will never be the same. Finally, Canadians and Americans will be able to hold hands across the 49th parallel and sing Kumbaya.

Someone's twitching lord, Kumbaya...

Labels: grammar

This "orthodontic journey" of mine has been a whole world of pain, and I don't even have the braces on yet! (Doesn't it make you twitch that everything has become a "journey" nowadays? When someone gets booted from a reality TV show, they're always talking about how, "I've had such an incredible journey, blah blah blah." I'm sorry, but if you haven't actually travelled anywhere, or you're not a band that was popular in the 70s/80s, it's not a freakin' journey!)

First, I had to have four teeth pulled out to make enough room in my mouth for the braces to move the teeth around. This was an incredibly traumatic experience because a) I've never had any real dental work done before (besides wisdom teeth being taken out, but they gave me the good drugs for that, so it doesn't count) and b) my dentist, for some gawdawful and completely inexplicable reason, doesn't believe in gassing and drugging his patients out of their misery. I didn't discover this second fact until it was too late to reschedule the appointment and still keep the orthodontist appointments I had booked. So, I sucked it up. And cried in front of my dentist and his assistant. In my defense, I warned them ahead of time that I was really stressed, and they still wouldn't give me drugs. So, I told myself, I will not be ashamed of crying. If I need to cry, I will, because that's my right.

I was actually doing pretty well until the first tooth made this huge popping noise as it came out of its socket. Ugh, that sound will haunt me to the end of my days. Well, once I heard that, I just lost it and started shaking and crying. It was a nice little public breakdown that could have been averted with drugs, but hey, I'm not bitter. Just emotionally scarred.

I went back for a second appointment two weeks later to get the two teeth on the other side of my mouth taken out. The problem this time was that the dentist had injured my lower jaw (which is perpetually injured and the reason I need the braces in the first place) when he took out the first two teeth. So, every time he tried to pull my tooth, I'd have to stop him because the pressure he put on my jaw caused such excruciating pain. He started getting really flustered and upset and you could tell he felt helpless and didn't know what to do. He even asked me, "What can I do so that you won't be in pain?" I wanted to say, "Hey, I'm not the one with the doctorate in dentistry, buddy!" Eventually, he ended up wrapping his arm around my head to stabilize my jaw and yanking away.

I hope I never have to go through that again. Kids, this is the reason your mom told you to brush and floss!

On Friday, I went to my first orthodontic appointment to get elastics put in between my teeth. Yes, you read that right. Elastics now reside in the place where I previously had difficulty fitting floss. And, as you can imagine, it hurts like a bitch and makes it almost impossible to chew anything. It's going to be like this for the next two weeks. It almost makes me look forward to when the braces will be strapped on, because then, at least, the elastics will be gone.

Also at this appointment, I had to watch a video about all the things that you're not allowed to do with braces. Nothing like focusing on the positive before you even have the braces, right? The assistant led me to a room with a TV/VCR and a 10-year-old kid and his mom. Then, she gave me a bag with all the orthodontic cleaning supplies I'd need to start me on my "journey". Also in the bag was a snack-sized package of cheesy poofs. I guessed this was an endorsement of the kind of snack food I should be eating with braces - soft and airy rather than hard and crunchy. When I saw the bag, I exclaimed, "Hey, cool, cheesy poofs!"

The 10-year-old kid said, somewhat despondently, "I didn't get any cheesy poofs." Apparently, the assistant had gotten his kit from a different room where cheesy poofs were in short supply.

I replied, "Hey, they're breaking open my jaw and wiring it shut. I think I've earned these cheesy poofs!" Yes, a bigger person would have given the kid the chips, but screw that. They're my cheesy poofs!

We then watched the video, which basically told us our lives would be over. With braces, you're not allowed to eat anything but moosh and cheesy poofs. But the moosh can't have curry in it, because that would stain the clear braces. And come on, what's moosh without curry? You're also not allowed to drink coffee, but I was fine with that because that's the one vice I don't have. The video was quite overdramatic, making statements like, "Of course, smoking would be disastrous", implying that if you disobeyed any of the rules, a great earthquake would open up the earth, swallowing up not only you and your family, but also your precious, precious braces. I was doing pretty well until the video said that I couldn't have red wine.

"Nooooooooooooo!" I exclaimed. The 10-year-old kid's mom turned and gave me a look that was either sympathetic or patronizing. I'm guessing the latter. She was probably still bitter that I wouldn't give her kid the cheesy poofs.

So, here's my conundrum: In the next two weeks, I want to eat all the things that I won't be able to eat once I have braces, only the elastics between my teeth make chewing so painful that I can't eat what I want.

But if I had my way, I'd be at the Ethiopian restaurant every day, pigging out on curry, strung out on caffeine and covered in red wine, chewing toffee and bubble gum, crunching on ice, eating corn on the cob and popcorn, and smoking cigars. But that would be disastrous. Oh well, just pass the freakin' cheesy poofs then.

Labels: jaw surgery, orthodontics

I have been the recipient of male attention lately, which has surprised me, because it's been a long time coming. At first, I thought it was the blonde hair, but the phenomenon didn't go away when I became a pseudo brunette. I have a few theories on this. The first one is that I am almost ready to date, after more than two years of mentally kicking my own ass for dating Mr. E. After that horrible experience, which I will tell you about sometime but not today, I seriously doubted my own judgment. I mean, I chose someone with no soul as my partner and actually contemplated marrying him - could I even be trusted to pick which pair of black socks to wear today? I'm finally starting to let it go and forgive myself for past mistakes. I'm hoping that this experience will mean that I will choose much better in the future. So, my first theory is that I am more open to meeting someone, and that may be attracting people to me.

But the problem is, it's not the right kind of people. I'm getting hit on by really young guys and guys with girlfriends. They seem to be drawn to me without my doing anything to provoke it. So, this is where the second theory comes in. They say that women hit their sexual peak at age 30. So, I'm thinking that, now that I'm 30, I'm emitting all sorts of pheromones into the atmosphere. And they're being picked up by little boys who are also at their sexual peak.

Here is an example:

I'm out at a pseudo redneck bar (Jeez, this is starting to become a theme in my entries. For the record, I would like to state that I'm not a redneck. Though I do burn easily) with some friends and am approached by a cute guy who flirts with me by dragging my chair along with him as he walks by. How suave! After some strange flirty conversation, the guy pulls out his ID for some unknown reason and shows it to me. I notice that he has two middle names, one of which is Zachary (how trendy!), but fail to notice his first name because I become fixated on his year of birth: 1985.

Nineteen freaking eighty-five!! How is that even possible? There were people born in the 80s who are now going to the bar? How can this guy be hitting on me when I was experimenting with hairspray and buying my first cassette tape in the year he was born? Interestingly, 1985 was the year that I met the friend who I was at the bar with. I've had a friendship as long as this guy's been alive. And now, he's trying to get into my pants.

It makes me feel worse to realize that in three years, people born in 1990 will be going to the bar. I should probably just give in and put myself on a wait list for a hip replacement now. Damn, I'm old.

Anyway, after my initial shock, my friends and I get up to dance and the young guy follows us. He asks how old we are, and I tell him, hoping this will scare him off because I feel like a total pedophile at this point.

Savia: We're 30.
Young Guy: Really?
Savia: Yeah. And she [motioning to my friend] has three kids.
Friend: My oldest one's 11 years old.
Young Guy: Wow! You guys are the hottest 30-year olds I've ever met! That's awesome!
Savia: [trying to knock some sense into the kid's head] You don't understand - we're cougars!
Young Guy: You're not cougars, you're tigers. And I'm a gazelle!

Well, it's hard to argue with that logic. So, we danced some more. Then:

Young Guy: Guess how old I am!
Savia: You already showed me your ID. You were born in 1985.
Young Guy: Just guess.
Savia: You were born in 1985. (God, do I have to keep thinking about that date??)
Young Guy: You should ask that lady over there how old I am [gesturing to a blonde woman who looks like she's in her late 30s].
Savia: Why would I ask her?
Young Guy: Because that's my mom.

Oh, dear god. Not only was he born in 1985, but he was at the bar with his freaking mother who didn't look much older than me.

My friend's husband tried to convince me to take the guy home, saying, "But you know he's a nice guy, because he's here with his mom." I'm sorry, but there's no way in hell you can pick up a young guy born in a year in which you were babysitting kids older than him and who is at the bar with his mother. It's just wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

It's official: I'm never getting lucky.

Labels: sex, sketchy bars

Twisty has brought to our attention the gross misuse of the word "enormity". This is going to drive me crazy because now I know it's there.

This is what dictionary.com had to say:
e·nor·mi·ty
n. pl. e·nor·mi·ties
The quality of passing all moral bounds; excessive wickedness or outrageousness.
A monstrous offense or evil; an outrage.
Usage Problem. Great size; immensity

Usage Note: Enormity is frequently used to refer simply to the property of being great in size or extent, but many would prefer that enormousness (or a synonym such as immensity) be used for this general sense and that enormity be limited to situations that demand a negative moral judgment....Writers who ignore the distinction, as in the enormity of the President's election victory or the enormity of her inheritance, may find that their words have cast unintended aspersions or evoked unexpected laughter.

Now that I know, it will make me twitch every time someone uses the word incorrectly. It's like the time one of my co-workers pointed out that I was using "over" incorrectly. For years, I had happily written stories stating things such as "they raised over $1 million to eradicate gingivitis" and "she has over 300 oranges stockpiled to fight scurvy." (Yes, I am on a weird dental kick here, but I'll tell you all about my traumatic teeth pulling incident later.) But as soon as my considerate co-worker pointed out that I should be using "more than" for numbers instead of "over" (because "over" refers to a physical position, while "more than" refers to quantity), I could never go back. Now, when I see other people using it incorrectly, I have to fix it. And I feel ashamed that I didn't know this simple distinction in the first place. Me, the Comma Queen, the Semicolon Princess, the Grammar Rodeo Royalty! It's my pet peeve, and has been added to my grammatical crusade to eradicate comma splices, the improper use of the possessive apostrophe, and any reference to "shrimps" in Asian restaurant menus.

And now, I have something new to be neurotic about. The enormity of it all pisses me off!

What's your grammatical pet peeve?

Labels: grammar

Excerpt from an invitation to a New Year's Eve party:

Come to my place on New Years Eve.

Of course you should bring your own fucking booze. What, do I look like your own personal brew pub? Piss off!

Maybe bring food too. As IF I have food. (oh, I might have some....you're certainly a demanding lot, eh?)

But come over. And let me know if you're coming. If there's a hoard I'll need to borrow chairs. And maybe a new apartment.

Most of you have probably met each other through me at one time or another, so don't be all chicken shit like "Awwwwwww....I won't KNOW anyone......"

Right. Stop whining. Let's get pissed!!!!

Labels: misc