The Hills Are Alive With The Sound of Nostalgia

Why do I find myself more distressed than Lauren's Hollister jean skirt as of late?

BECAUSE LC IS NOT MARRYING STEPHEN, THAT'S WHY.  To be fair, I'm also pissed about Justin Timberlake and Britney Spears ending. As well as Hilary Duff and Aaron Carter. And basically any couple that I liked in the early 00's.  Life's a beach and I just can't sandal it.  I want life to be a Laguna Beach.  Full of Sun-In and petty high school arguments and awkward moments where Lauren says some vapid statement that girls latch onto and immediately put into their AIM profiles.  Below you will find my fantasy LC marriage scene.  However, let it be known that the following scenario was not shot over an eight month period in the city of Laguna Beach, California.  It is from my imagination.  Therefore, the people, the locations, and the drama are 100% not real and 100% not funny.  

The chairs are set up along the beach in pristine rows, like the red lines on a piece of looseleaf paper or the heavy black eyeliner sitting atop every female attendee's eyelids.  The waves crashing against the shore drown out the sound of Christina singing "My Only Hope" while the salty sea air licks the open wounds that only a successful Rent audition could have healed.

Stephen, standing next to Christina's minister father, looks dashing in a Hurley shirt and matching swim trunks.  He does not know that at that very moment a young Taylor Swift is singing along to herself in the darkness of her room with only the television illuminating her face.  She watches as Kristen dances on a bar in Cabo, shakes her head, and whispers "white whores" to the empty room.  Her future song and music video starring Stephen is to be called "White Horse."  This is no
coincidence.  

 Jason (known as Wally to a select few friends) watches from the back row with a blank look on his face.  As Jason's perfectly gelled hair blows gently in the breeze, we hear a wistful sigh from Jessica who is sniffing his hair while sitting directly behind him.  Alex M. looks on in disgust and sticks her face into a bowl of Cheetos.  A mother nearby cradles her crying child closer and scoots down a seat.

Morgan sits nearby, muttering under her breath.  She has resolved not to stay in Laguna, yet here she sits wedged between Kristin and Alex H.  Kristin's hair is pulled loosely into a tiny ponytail which contrasts with her tight tube top and jean skirt.  She is playing snake on her flip phone and her choker shell necklace glints in the sunlight blinding Alex H, who has not showered in a few weeks.

The crowd stands, LC is gracefully walking down the sand in rolled up jean capris and wedged flip flops. The little person from the Blink 182 concert that Trey so valiantly argued with is perched in some nearby crabgrass, biding his time, waiting.  For what?  He does not know.  He will never know.

Suddenly, there is a clap of lightening.  Beads of perspiration form on LC's upper lip.  There will be no suitable firewood for the beach bonfire immediately following the ceremony.  Lo laughs in the background, "It ain't no thing but a chicken wing!"  LC scowls, she is still upset that Lo admonished her for failing a class her senior year.  You never side with a bff's parents when it comes to grades, it's just, like, the rules of feminism.

The rain drops slowly at first, then quickly builds momentum.  Large pellets of water come from every angle, the crowd runs for cover under the nearby shelter.  Jessica trips and falls.  "Leave her," someone shouts.  Through the mayhem, the shrieks, and the orange self-tanner forming a small river along the beach, LC does not budge.  The black mascara tears streaming down her face and plopping onto her strapless shirt do not perturb her.  "Let the rain fall down and wake my dreams.  Let it wash away my sanity," she croaks before swan diving into the ocean and taking up residence with Ariel in the murky depths of the Pacific where she will give Scuttle thingamabobs in exchange for stray french fries from Jack In The Box.

Somewhere, Hilary Duff plays the harp and Heidi Montag's melted face floats out to sea.


Peace, love, and the twisted inner working of my mind regurgitated into blog form,

Awkward Girl

BRING IT ON, EARLY TWENTIES.

It seems I haven't written a blog post in quite some time now.  Now, I could pretend that I've just been super busy (which isn't a complete lie) or I could tell the truth and say that blog posts scare me. Not in the "guys with long dirty fingernails" way, but close to it.  The fact is, stringing words together just isn't as easy as stringing uncooked pasta onto yarn.  Don't get me wrong, I love writing.  Sometimes it's just hard to get those creative juices flowing when pulp is stuck in your crazy straw.  Anyway, I'm going to talk about my life in the next few paragraphs.  Stop reading if you don't care about me. Or if you do care about me. Truth is, Hercules is on Netflix and that's a hell of a lot more entertaining than anything I'm about to write.

First order of business: Yes, that is a photo of me from last Halloween. I want you guys to know that I am a real human being with hair and a face. The tips of my hair aren't blue, but we can pretend they are. Also, TELL ME I'M PRETTY. Haha, I kid, I kid.

Second order of business: SENIOR YEAR HAS ARRIVED.  I live in a house with six other girls, which is fun because now the blame is dispersed amongst six other people when the cookies mysteriously go missing.  Classes are fun in the way that getting tree sap on your hands is fun.  I'm at a job that I really like. I'd say "love," but I'm physically incapable of loving any establishment that doesn't have a freezer full of those Spongebob popsicles with the gumball eyes.  Life has been a bit hectic, hence why I haven't been tweeting as much.  If you can believe it, there is a beautiful world outside of your smartphone full of sunshine and squirrels and dollar drink specials.  Graduation is right around the corner, but so is Dairy Queen, which means that any anxiety that I might have about becoming an adult can easily be washed down with a cold milkshake.

Third order of business: I HAVE A BOYFRIEND. Haha, just kidding.  I reactivated my Tinder for a day and remembered how awful the average college male is, so no complaints here.  I've decided that my "type" is a mix of The Buried Life guys, Cory Matthews, Scott Disick and Eric from The Little Mermaid.  So if you are a fun-loving sarcastic fellow with curly dark hair and a mermaid for a girlfriend HMU. Or if you have a pulse, whatever.

Fourth order of business: I'M GOING TO BE A WORLD CLASS TRAVELER. Kind of. First stop, Cancun for a week full of queso and bad decisions (revolving around queso).  I'm staying at some place that sounds like a stripper name, should be promising.  Second stop, Europe for two weeks after graduation.  The second stop isn't official or anything, but I've only drunkenly eaten a baguette in the U.S. so it might be cool to do it overseas.  Also, I would love to walk the streets of England (Britain? United Kingdom?) and hum Fergie's "London Bridge" while searching for a cute guy to make out with in an air duct. Please tell me you've seen Winning London because if you haven't then you'll probably think I'm a hussy.

Fifth order of business: Anyway, there's some stringing of words for you.  Nothing too exciting, but it's me, so what'd you expect?

Peace, love, and I feel like I have to end the post this way because consistency is key,

Awkward Girl

I don't hiss and smell.

Here's the thing: PDA is awful. And I'm not talking about the cute couple innocently holding hands at the mall, I'm referring to that guy in front of you in the line at the Verizon store rubbing his girlfriend's butt.  Excuse me mister, but can you please wish for me to be transported to a land far away that has copious amounts of puppies and popsicles because clearly your girlfriend's rear end is some sort of magical genie lamp.  Also, sweet flip phone.

*Sips from Capri Sun pouch*

Here's the other thing: College is awesome. That fun motorcycle-riding uncle with the tattoo who took you out for ice cream as a kid and drunkenly starts congo lines at family weddings is like if college were a person.  College is a sacred institution in which the beer flows freely (both down your mouth and all over your shirt), the chicken fingers are always cooked to perfection and getting yelled at by drunk guys on roofs when you're walking back from the library on a Thursday night is inevitable.  It's like a summer camp except all the bug juice is spiked.  You're in that awkward "I'm kind of an adult, but LOL not really" phase and it's marvelous. 

Adulthood is that annoying ex (that I've read so much about in novels) who incessantly drunk dials you and sends texts saying "You up? You know you have an 8 AM class tomorrow, you should really go to bed."  Excuse me Adulthood, but you're being super desperate and it's a major turn off.  Our relationship won't be Facebook official until May of 2014 and until then I will be playing the field with this plate of pizza and Lizzie McGuire movie that I just bought for 5 bucks at Half Price Books.

*Blows up now empty Capri Sun pouch, offers it to friend, laughs hysterically*

Here's the final thing: College = PDA central. Drunken tightly packed hormonal specimens in dark enclosed quarters with liquid courage coursing through their veins and Ke$ha playing in their heads are to PDA as frat guys are to tank tops.  There's always someone making out in a corner or grinding or doing weird things that are just not okay.  Can't we wait until we're in the comfort of our footie pajamas are all that touchy stuff?  

In the words of Cher Horowitz, you see how picky I am about my shoes and they only go on my feet.  Just because we had a lovely conversation about Nintendo 64 Tony Hawk pro skater and our affinity for all things Harry Potter does not mean I want you to jump down my throat.  Unless your name is General Tso, then hey bb u look delicious ;) 

Basically, I just want us all to be respectable nice young people and not engage in make out sessions in the middle of bars because that's tacky.  Pretend you're under a microscope. A literal microscope. The bar is a petri dish. Your sweet plaid pants-wearing grandpa with the hearing aids watches in horror as you let some guy grope you in front of the bartender. That is all.

Peace, love, and SAY NO TO PDA,

Awkward Girl

P.S. THIS HAPPENED LAST NIGHT AND I'M STILL CRINGING:

(the entire conversation involved me rambling on about how awkward I am)

Guy at bar: So then have you ever been awkwardly kissed?

*leans in*

Me: YEAH AND I DON'T WANT IT HAPPENING AGAIN

*drops mic, walks off stage, trips, questions whether or not I should've let him kiss me in the middle of the bar, decides that's gross, worries he could've been my future husband, shrugs, orders 10 chicken nuggets at McDonalds and pays for the cab driver's too*

Try to kiss me once at a bar and succeed because you kind of just went for it and I didn't have time to process what was going on, but ultimately shame on me.

Try to kiss me four years later at a bar and fail because I'M A CONFIDENT YOUNG WOMAN HEAR ME ROAR, no shame on me. Just a nail polish stain.

The Butterfly Effect

No, this is not a post about 2004's science-fiction psychological thriller film starring Ashton Kutcher and Amy Smart, but rather an ode to the claws of cuteness that sat a perch my first grade tangled hair for the entire duration of the 1999-2000 school year.  The butterfly clips were not simply a 90's fad, but a cultural phenomenon that shaped me into the lanky, rosy-cheeked individuals that I am today.  What exactly was the effect that these plastic winged insects of the order Lepidoptera had on me?

1) They taught me to think outside the box.  My brother used the Easy Bake Oven without my permission?  No big deal, I would simply remove my clips to make an instant stockpile of winged weapons that were then strategically placed on his bedroom floor.  I was well aware that Legos can't touch butterfly clips in the "sharp pointy things that make your barefoot hurt like a mother when you step on them" category.

2) They taught me that pain is temporary, but pride lasts forever. Attaching a butterfly clip to my cheek is not one of my finer moments, but what's a girl to do when her friend challenges her to a contest as to who can keep the clip on their face the longest?  I mean, there were Dunkaroos and Fruit-By-The-Foots, not to mention bragging rights at stake!

3) They taught me that imperfection is beauty. One of the wings of my butterfly clip broke at recess and I was devastated, but no one even noticed.  In fact, one girl thought I had bought it like that and was jealous that mine was different than hers.  Score!

4) They taught me that life goes on.   Inevitably (maybe it was 2001, the exact date is unknown), butterfly clips became a thing of the past.  A remnant of a forgotten era, they were placed with my polly pockets, spiral shoelaces, and power beads, nestled into my baby blanket, packed into a huge chest and brought up to the attic where they currently reside. I grew up, they became obsolete.  Change is the only constant. Beauty is skin deep. One in the hand is worth two in the bush. Yada, yada, yada.

5) They taught me that memories fade, but bald spots (due to the twisting and pulling of various strands of hair tightly back into a clip) last forever. 

Peace, love, and bald spots

Awkward Girl

AIMless Ramblings

Before Siri, there was SmarterChild.  Before "report spam," there was "warning."  Before dubstep, there was dial up internet.  Before I became cool, haha just kidding I'm still not cool.  I hate to lump us all together into a big Koosh® ball of uncoolness, but as former *dAnCeRChiCK*'s and x3soccergalx3's--none of us can ever claim coolness.  We had 12 inside jokes or a cheesy friendship quote with all of our friend's initials listed beneath in our profiles.  We made our bff IM a guy (while we were on the phone with her) to see if he liked us.  Every conversation circa 2004 that we had went like this:

Hey.

Hey.

What's up?

Nm, u?

Same.

*awkward silence*

BRB

k

*never comes back*

All the cool kids had away messages like this:

desperate then greys

555.1242

call/text it

While we (okay, maybe just I) had away messages like this:

Eating Wendy's chili......OMG I FOUND A FINGER!

The cool thing about away messages is that half the time we weren't even really away from our computers.  No, we were usually sitting right there perusing the Internet for our next clever buddy icon because icons to us were like boys to Taylor Swift--fun for a week or so, but soon traded in for the next big thing.

First there was the Pringles icon, then there was the Paris Hilton animated stick figure icon where she drops a loaf of bread and a "That's hot!" speech bubble appears, then there was the "Rip, slip, brush, AHHHH!" icon and then there was a bunch of equally mindless, yet entertaining ones.  Naturally, we'd IM SmarterChild right away and ask his opinion on our new icon--to which he would reply "Hey Sexy!"  We'd laugh because we had told him our name was "Sexy" when we first started our friendship.  What clever little devils we were.  

Basically, you can take the girl out of the AIM, but you can't take the AIM out of the girl.  To this very day, the resounding echo of the AIM "door slam" rings in my head when no one laughs at my jokes.  Similarly, the creaking of the door plays in my head when that cute guy from class walks into the bar.

Peace, love, and AIM MeMoRieS <3

Awkward Girl

P.S. Before emojis there were these:

Throwback Thursday

Ah, the 90s/early 2000s.  It was a simple time-- a time of easy bake ovens, Mary-Kate and Ashley straight-to-VHS movies, Slime Time Live, spiral shoelaces, skip-it, frosted tips and tons and tons of other awesome things.  I'm going to *try* to write a Throwback Thursday post every week reminiscing on the golden days (we'll see how this pans out) because 2013 is so gross.  I feel sorry for the kids that don't know the Zoog Disney "Let's watch a Disney channel movie" song that played before every, well, Disney channel movie.  A girl I worked with who was just a few years younger than me didn't know why Nick Lachey was famous (other than the fact that he was married to Jessica Simpson and is extremely attractive).  Crazy, crazy times we live in.  In an effort to revive your and my monotonous Thursdays, I present to you the first order of business: GEL PENS!

"And on the seventh day, God rested and he was pleased with what he had created. Except he noticed there were no gel pens, and so gel pens rained down from the heavens and fell onto the land" (Book of Awkward Girl 3:11-12).  Even this picture of these bright colored assorted writing utensils is making my heart go all jiggly and is causing a huge smile to creep onto my face.  I received the above pack of gel pens for my 8th birthday and it is still one of my favorite presents to date.

Teachers just didn't understand the firm grasp these vessels of happiness had on their students.  I DON'T CARE IF YOU CAN'T READ MY TANGERINE COLORED INK ON THAT WHITE PIECE OF PAPER, MRS. SMITH.  Haha, just kidding, I cared--which is why I stopped using these bad boys when my grade school enacted a "no gel pens during class" ban.  Interestingly enough, I didn't stop carrying around my Pokemon cards when a similar ban was enacted, but that's another story.

One of my first (what I thought was) funny statements involved me asking a friend if they "gel-ous" that I had more gel pens than them and they didn't get it--but it didn't matter because I HAD MORE GEL PENS THAN THEM.  It was the currency of my 2nd grade class, which sparked controversy when some kid tried to swap his cheap gel pen for someone else's state-of-the-art swirly one.

Basically, these were awesome and I miss them.


Peace, love, and swirly colored goodness in a plastic tube,

Awkward Girl

CATastrophe

We all have our fears. For some it's heights, while maybe the sight of a spider makes others' skin shrivel up and crawl right off their body.  For me, it's cats. Yes, you read that right, cats. I'm not going to pretend that I'm referring to the king of the jungle tigers/lions/panthers/cougars. Nope, I'm talking about the little bundle of fur that you might be curled up next to at this very moment.  I've received many @replies about cats and if I like them and I thought I'd write this little blog post to clear up any confusion that might be floating around.

Cool, I haven't found my Ryan Gosling knight in shining Under Armour, whatever.  But does this have to mean that I have to love cats?  Cats are not my cup of tea. In fact, cats are my stubborn pouch of Capri Sun that I can't seem to poke that pesky yellow straw into.  Maybe it's because I didn't grow up around them, but they just evoke a fear in me that is only rivaled by my fear of girls with perfectly curled hair. How do you create those beachy waves, Courtney? HOW?

 Back to cats.  A Facebook friend was in the musical "Cats" and I couldn't even bring myself to look at the pictures. What's scarier than a life-size "cat" that is actually a human pretending to be a cat?  Though, to be fair, if a human was dressed up as a dog, I'd probably scream at my laptop screen too.  I don't know though because Simba playfully bats at my heart strings as if they're strings of yarn.  Because cats do that, right?  Like, bat at yarn and stuff? If they don't then they do now because I just pretended they did.  

On the one hand, fingers.  On the other hand, more fingers.  Haha, no, but back to cats.  I freak out when they purr and rub up against my legs, like I visibly get frazzled and immediately sit Indian style.  They're also so smart, like, I'm positive that every cat I've ever met somehow knows that I stole those jolly ranchers from the teacher's private stockpile in third grade.  Can cats go on walks?  Or ride in cars?  Serious questions, people. I am as ignorant when it comes to cats as I am on painting my nails without getting nail polish all over my skin.  

 If you like cats, good for you.  If you like dogs, good for you.  Just thought I'd let you guys know that I will never let the cat outta the bag because I'm terrified it might get my tongue and gouge my eyes out and sing "Shine Bright Like a Diamond" on repeat while bouncing on my head.


Curiosity didn't kill the cat, I did 
(haha just kidding, I don't kill anything but jokes),

Awkward Girl