It's Victoria's Secret Catalog Day!

First of all, I'd like to thank anybody and everybody who's been reading and sympathizing with over the past few weeks. I've been in a severe funk, and I'm not exactly Al Roker status happy now, but I'm doing a little bit better. I had a really good session with my psychiatrist on Thursday, cried my eyes out, and came away feeling a lot better. What I really need now is hope. Hope that I can find employment, and a band, and a sort of capability at life. Hope that I can get the heck out of this hideous little town and start hanging out with more kids that have similar interests. Hope that I can take inspiration from the troubles I've had coping with you-know-who and come upon a better tomorrow. The meeting with my shrink sort of gave me that. It's been a pretty successful day too. I'm five chapters into the novel I'm writing, and I think I'm going to be able to have my truck up and running by next week. That's going to improve my condition severely, having my own vehicle. Thanks for sticking by me during my dark times.

So I got the latest Victoria's Secret catalog. Well, I didn't, actually it was addressed to someone else and it was sent to my house by mistake. My parents and I agreed that it would be uncomfortable to try to give the catalog back to its intended recipient, and they probably didn't want anything out of it anyway. The kind of women that are in Victoria's Secret catalogs usually aren't the kind of women I'm especially attracted to, but two things in the catalog caught my eye.



Apparently Victoria's Secret sells professional attire. I didn't know that, but that's good to know, because if I had to buy professional attire for a woman, now I'd know where to go. I like to shop at Men's Warehouse for my professional attire, and as the name would suggest, they don't sell much in the way of women's clothing.



Speaking of gendered clothing, Victoria's Secret is selling something called a 'boyfriend cardigan.' If the reader chooses not to delve into the subtext of his or her Victoria's Secret catalog, the term 'boyfriend cardigan' is clearly bizarre. I speculate that the boyfriend cardigan is so named because it has its roots in the tradition of girlfriends acquiring a boyfriends old sweatshirts or other tops, which they can wear around the house and have fond thoughts of him. All those poor women who don't have boyfriends (and want them, because there's plenty of women who don't have boyfriends and are totally cool with that) have to spend $48 on a cardigan just so they can emulate the experience. In fact, if a woman doesn't want a boyfriend, the boyfriend cardigan is a great way to have the best parts of the single life and the best parts of a relationship, all in one. Or maybe the name 'boyfriend cardigan' is intended to insinuate that the cardigan is supposed to be bought for a woman by her boyfriend. Or maybe the whole phrase '$48 boyfriend cardigan' is the name of the clothing, and it's a cardigan intended for boyfriends that cost $48. The woman in the picture looks nothing like what I imagine a $48 boyfriend would look like, but there's probably a lot of airbrushing and what-have-you that goes on. Also, why is she chewing on her finger?

In related news, I randomly came across a Wikipedia article which states (and I quote):

There is some evidence that there may be a difference on how women online rate male attractiveness as opposed to how men rate female attractiveness. The distribution of ratings given by men of female attractiveness appears to look like a standard bell curve (normal distribution), while ratings of men given by women is highly skewed with 80% of the men rated as below average. This shows women are genuinely more picky than men when it comes to online dating. It could also potentially arise from women assessing other profile characteristics besides appearance, like their occupation for example.

I find that quote disturbing. Stop being so fucking picky, women of the world. I need some lovin', hot damn it!

I forgot to mention.

I have a wonderful, wonderful friend who I'm going to not name. I had a short visit with her while I was in Chico. She just went through a really awful breakup, and then another breakup with a rebound. I felt really bad because I could just tell she was doing awful. She wasn't sleeping or eating, and she was going though that unshakable, crushing sadness that comes with a bad breakup. I wish there was more I could do.

Anyway, she told me that she'd recently stopped drinking, because she'd gotten drunk and done something disorderly that resulted in her getting arrested. That made me feel good, because she's one of the sweetest, kindest people I've ever known, and if she is making those kind of decisions after a breakup, that sort of makes my issues surrounding you-know-who seem like small potatoes.

Naiya Sullivan

So I briefly mentioned a woman named Naiya Sullivan here. I did some stand up at her artspace tonight, and it was really cool. I got into Chico yesterday and I helped her acquire a couch with my father's pickup truck, so we've kind of hung out for a bit. She's seriously totally fucking awesome, and I'm really happy to have gotten to spend time with her, but as far as feeling that way about her, I just don't see any sparks flying. You know, we're both rad people, but the chemistry's just not there. C'est la vie. To be completely honest, I'm a little relived. Intimate affection is such a difficult thing to manage for me, that I'd rather have a rad new friend than a rad new romantic person in my life.

Julia Gillard

She's sort of cute. I like her hair.

Marcella "Sally" Grace Eiler

I've been thinking a lot about suicide these past few weeks. I can't shake this feeling like there's a whole world out there being jolly and social and being able to talk to girls without them feeling creeped out and, for some reason, I was born without whatever special password you need to get into the club. Here I am, spending night after night staying up until some ungodly hour spinning my Julie Doiron records until they spin smooth. I know I'm not going to kill myself, but I think about it a lot. I'm going to Chico this weekend, so hopefully that will clear my head a little.



I have this wonderful, wonderful friend who is a very busy woman, but when she has time to talk, I've never felt more listened to and understood in my life. It's like I'm really alive and I'm a real person for once and the things I do in my life matter. Anyway, she just posted this link on facebook about a friend of a friend of hers who was raped and murdered a couple of years ago in Mexico. She sounds like she was really cool and she had neat hair and I bet she had a really great laugh. Now she's gone. Thanks a fuck of a lot, universe.

I feel necessarily ugly. Ugly in spirit. I feel like I'm trapped in this sort of Calvinistic lover's gloom where I'm not capable of doing anything that's okay. I am designated as the anti-love. I ruin the life of everything I touch. I try to really be a wonderful thing for someone, and the devil just laughs harder.

Your blood is on my hands. You're better off without me.

Watching this kind of makes me amorous.

Case In Point

I'm really feeling lonely and desperate right now.

The House of The Devil

I try not to talk to much about stuff besides girls on here, but oh man, I watched House of The Devil last night, and it was really really cool. It's got the best 1980's flavor that I've ever seen from a movie that wasn't really done in the 1980's. Also, it was just generally well done. The ending sort of disappointed me, but I'm pretty hard to please in that area.

There were two really cute girls in the movie. Greta Gerwig was in it, and it was too bad she was killed quickly and unceremoniously (I don't give a fuck about a spoiler) because she was cute and her character was cool.



Jocelin Donahue was the star of the movie, and she's really good looking, but moreover, her character seemed really awesome and a lot like a final girl in an 80's slasher movie.



Other than that, I've been really upset about generally where my life is at right now, and my lacking romantic resume and overriding loneliness has given me a lot of trouble. Seriously. Things ain't been very nice.

The List

I was just cleaning off my desk, and I found this. You probably can't read it. So I'll explain.

Last July, I was going to go to Chico for Gruk's last show. I was also meeting up with one of my favorite friends, who moved to DC a couple of years ago, and I haven't seen in some time. A couple of nights before we were in Chico, we were talking on the phone about the trip and I was a little drunk, and I (with his help) started making a list of all the women in Chico who I had always sort of had a thing for, with the intent of catching up with them and seeing if now would be a good time to make something work.

Here's the list in all it's glory:


Meredith.
She's a really awesome girl who's really really cute and used to sing for this band called Dirty Sister, that I thought was good but not great. For a long time, she was dating this guy named Carlos who doesn't like me very much. I can't remember why she was crossed off the list, but it's probably because someone told me she was seeing someone.


Maria (AKA Mexican Emily)
I never officially met her when I was living in Chico, but I had a really nice conversation with her about a year ago when I did stand up for a Shankers show in Chico. We were both kind of drunk, but it seemed to me like we really clicked. Nobody I talked to knew anything about her current haunts or relationship status.


Kristie (AKA Corpus Kristie)
Kristie is my hairdresser and she's really nice and neat and interesting. She got crossed off because she's been in this on again, off again relationship with this guy named Jared for years now, and when I checked, it was on again. Jared's a really cool guy too.


Pu-wu
She's this really colourful artist chick who I think has a kid, I never actually met her, but I thought she was cute from afar at a couple of art shows. A friend said that she was king of crazy, and I don't think I want that, so maybe it's okay that I never met her.


Becca @ Natty (AKA Becca who works at Chico Natural Foods)
She has a sort of small mouth and a weird nose, but in a really cute way. I'm not raggin' on her small mouth and weird nose, believe me. I think they're both adorable. Anyway, we were outside the Natty and I was remarking on how I was bummed that she wasn't working on the day that I was in Chico, and someone told me she was in a relationship that was pretty serious.


Sarah Kinavel
Sarah was in an acting class with me, and she was one of those girls who is shy and lacking in self confidence despite being totally adorable, which made me think I might have had a chance with her. I actually invited her to a stand up comedy show I did back in the day, and she didn't come, and I probably should have forgotten about her after that. In fact, I pretty much did, except when I was writing this list, I was drunk and I forgot about her not coming to the thing. Anyway, while I was in Chico, I couldn't find anyone who knew her so I just looked her up on Facebook, and Facebook says she's seeing someone.


Jessie
She's this hippie chick with dreadlocks down to her ankles that I wanted to be in a band with me back in the day. She never showed up for practice (and in her defense, I wasn't being very diligent about making sure everyone in the band was on the same page) so that was that. She's gotta be in her thirties, so it would be a really weird and probably distressing relationship. I couldn't find out anything about her current whereabouts/relationship status.


Monica?
I was trying to think of the name of this one girl, and I couldn't think of it, and my friend said he thought it might be Monica, but then it turns out we were thinking of two different girls.


Panama's Bartender
After I got back from Chico, somebody sent me a Facebook link to her and it said she was in a relationship. Also, she'd moved to Roseville or somewhere like that.


Jessica Roommates W/ Dana
I ran into Dana while I was in Chico and she said Jessica had moved and was in a relationship. I think she even said she was pregnant, but I don't remember. I was a little tore up at that point.


Gin
I didn't run into her or anyone who knew her current status while I was in Chico, but I found out later that she was moving and stuff. It's probably just as well, I think she was way outta my league. She has big boobs but was otherwise kind of alt cute, which means she could kind of have her pick of the litter. I'm not into big boobs really, so I'd probably give up on her before other men would. Does that make sense?


This girl named Naiya wrote her name and contact info on the back of the list. She runs a really cool sounding venue, and I can't wait for people in bands to contact me about getting a show in Chico, so I can send them her way. She's also really cool and drop dead gorgeous, but I'm not going to let myself get a crush on her, because I don't think I could get a crush on her without it turning around to bite me in the ass.

That's the end. There are a lot of other women in Chico who ought to have been on this list, but seeking out women isn't really that much fun anyway.

People who read WWCL around the world.

So I signed up to Google Analytics for my other blog, which I care about a lot more than this one.* Just for fun, I set up WWCL for Google Anatlycis as well. First of all, this blog gets about four times as many hits as my other one, and second of all, there's a number of folks from other countries who have been to WWCL. Check this out:

United States - 104 visits
France - 15 visits
United Kingdom - 11 visits
Poland - 9 visits
Canada - 9
Australia - 6

New Zeland spends, on average, the most time on WWCL. Russia spends the least.

Thank you for your interest, citizens of the world.

*Straight up. Granted, WWCL is a very therapeutic thing for me, and on those grounds I find it indispensable. However, the story of the women in my life is a story of pain and suffering, whereas my appreciation of music has always been a pleasant one.

Sylvia Plath

I was trying to remember which poet it was who's father might have been in the SS. I think it was Sylvia Plath. I was looking her up in the hopes of getting a confirmation on the father thing. She was really pretty. She's the kind of woman whom I'd really like to get along with, but probably wouldn't. I don't know why, but I feel like I'm predisposed to be at odds with every pretty, smart, emotional woman I come across. Like cats and dogs. I'm really depressed just thinking about it. I need to take a second and collect myself now.