welcome to the new look of debbierosenbaum.com and twenty-nothing.com.

think of it like plastic surgery: same bullshit. easier to look at.

a quick note about the sketch. a wonderfully gifted illustrator, leanne, drew her for me. had leanne read my blog before beginning, i doubt she would have obliged. my requests were: low rise jeans, flip flops, blue eyes, braids, red toe nails, my signature necklace, and a black tank top with lots of cleavage (which brian j. would probably refer to as a "shabbat shirt"). indeed, our lady-of-blog fits the bill. and she kinda looks like me too, which i guess is a bonus.

okay, okay. i know my breasts aren't that big. but when you have your own website and get to design your own cartoon, you're allowed to have any size breasts you want.

this blog is creative nonfiction. so is she.

please be patient while lisa (my blog hero) and i are working out the html code kinks. you should go check out her site of amazing work too. see e.webscapes link under "site info."

the thing about being twenty-something is that it's just as easy to lead a conference call with a half-dozen of the top lawyers in the city to discuss the execution of a communications strategy (which i did yesterday morning) as it is to instigate chair races down the halls at work (which i did yesterday afternoon). for me at least, it's a struggle between maintaining this "air of professionalism" with this "yen to be young."

i met with my hero (the jewish latino legislative consultant with business and law degrees -- ::sigh::) to get some advice about applying to grad schools. he offered some of the kindest and most insightful compliments to me (perhaps my mom paid him to?). i was just looking for an offer to read my personal statement and nine business school essays. instead, he decided he would use the opportunity for a pep talk: "debbie, you're mature beyond your years. but you don't have an old soul. you have a fire about you. anyone can see that."

i think that was supposed to be an admiring comment. unless, by using the word fire, he was insinuating that i was about to go up in flames. or my applications were. if you ask me, probably both.

but it begs the question (pre-law jargon), where is the balance between acting twice my age and half my age?

i'll have a diet coke with my cosi salad, as long as i can have a burping contest afterwards.

i'm happy to watch 20/20, as long as i can watch "pinky and the brain" occasionally. narf.

i don't mind wearing a suit, as long as i can wear something lacey and see-through underneath.

i love pointy shoes, as long as i carry around a pair of reefs for when i actually have to walk.

i know i'm supposed to wear a thong, as long as they can loud, obnoxious colors.

i don't care if i have to have a grown-up-looking room, as long as i can keep my stuffed animals on the bed.

i suppose i can learn to blow out my hair, as long as i can wear pigtail braids sometimes too.

i'm okay with living in a different city as my family, as long as i get to see my parents and siblings ... often.

i like wearing grown up clothes, as long as i can play dress up in my mom's 80's clothes with my sister.

you know what else i realized this morning? when you're twenty-something, you still have the food cravings of a kid, but you also get to do your own grocery shopping. right now, sitting on my kitchen counter i have: a half-eaten bag of doritos, a tub of different flavor chocolates, two bags of candy corn, a carton of liquor-filled chocolates (the ones that are shaped into a mini bottle and have a shot of liqueurs), and a vat of honey-roasted peanuts. and that's just because those things wouldn't fit in the pantry above ... which is filled with equally delicious "adult" foods).

so when am i supposed to give up these vices? is there a time when it's really not okay to leave my stuffed bunny on the bed? when it's not okay to cry in front of your boss?

where and when am i supposed to stop watching "the real world" end and living in the real world?

i just did the number one thing i swore i would never do at work.

(besides fart in front of my coworkers)

i just cried in front of my boss.

i'm not talking like eyes swelling and a little trouble speaking. i'm talking like full-on-river-generation-snot-flowing-and-there-is-no-damn-tissue-around crying.

and know why?

i just learned that i'm not superhuman. and i suck at some things. it turns out that i'm as prone to failure as everyone else is. fuck.

don't get me wrong; i'm not yet fully convinced that i'm human. but i now know that i'm not superhuman.

whoever said it was easy to be an overachiever was lying. you think i bring this crap on myself? you think i like to be a perfectionist? what i wouldn't give to be satisfied with mediocrity. is this what growing up is? admitting mortality? fine, i'm going to die one day; but can't i at least be superhuman until then?

my job is filled with monsters that i've never faced before. working for a guy who tells you you're stupid everyday is bad, but try working for a job where your efforts make you feel stupid everyday. then go home and stare at a stack of applications that are due soon. it's completely draining.

turns out, my job is also filled with lessons that i've never faced either. i'm trying to learn how to say no (which many boys will attest i'm not so good at). i'm trying to learn how to do everyone's job except mine. i'm trying to learn how to handle responsibility that is way beyond anything i've ever done. i mean, screwing up a jewish program on a college campus ... is one thing. screwing up when you work for a social justice organization that hundreds of thousands of people depend on ... is another. and i'm just trying to do the communications and public relations. way to be a do gooder, debbie. see what you've gotten yourself into?

so as i left my boss' office, i felt stupid and defeated. not just because i can't do my job well enough for someone else's expectations, but because i fucking cried.

so here's what i'm thinking: want to know what i want to do with the rest of my life? i want to be successful. and not successful in the financial sense (which would certainly be a bonus). i want to leave work everyday thinking i not only did something meaningful but that i also accomplished something. accomplished anything.

admitting imperfection might be the hardest thing i've ever done. and it is undoubtedly a lesson i will forget tomorrow.

they might as well black ball me from law schools and business schools. no one wants a mediocre cry baby.

mfa in creative nonfiction; here i come.

we all make assumptions ... whether or not we intentionally do so. we make assumptions about people based on their ethnicity, their gender and their hair color. we make assumptions about people based on the way they walk, the way they hold themselves and the way they pick their nose on the metro. we make assumptions when two girls hold hands or when we overhear an awkward conversation between two people on what can only be assumed to be their first date.

we make assumptions when (hypothetically, of course) a lady gets out of a hypothetical silver volvo in a parking lot that is hypothetically in st. louis, slams the door and shouts "you're not that lucky and i'm not that desperate!"

but maybe that only happens hypothetically with spi and me.

anyway.

i am always curious about the assumptions people make about me (well, especially curious when the assumption isn't based on a well crafted drama scene in a parking lot.) am i a "big" girl? am i awkward? am i annoying? do i look stupid in flip flops and a suit? really now: do i have a big butt?

yesterday was a small insight into that curiosity.

after a near internal combustion at work, i decided i needed to get some fresh air. and some cash. nothing puts me in a good mood like holding cash. which, like most twentysomethings i know, is quickly deflated by subsequently looking at my bank statement.

so, i stopped by the atm to restock my "emergency $20" which i depleted earlier in the day at starbucks (grande-nonfat-dry-vanilla-cappuccinos are expensive). i pushed the $40 withdrawal button, but only received $20. frustrated, i went into the adjoining bank to explain the situation to customer service. a very handsome man was tending the desk.

"not to insult your intelligence, but are you sure you pushed $40?"

"99% sure," i said

"well let's check it out." so he took my card and photo id and scanned it. while we were waiting, he asked how my weekend was.

"i spent the entire weekend writing applications."

"for what?" he asked.

"law school and business schools."

he looked at me skeptically. "well which one?"

"both," i said.

he stopped what he was doing.

"so i guess that means i'm moron and only pushed $20?" i asked.

"still don't know," he replied. "i'm trying to figure out how a cute girl like you wants to turn her pretty curls gray with that much school." this is the problem with being notuglynotpretty. we get hit on by bus drivers and customer service representatives at banks, but never abercrombie employees.

turns out, i only hit $20.

"damn," i mumbled.

shit. this guy probably assumed i was trying to pull a scam to steal money. and then stupid over here said "damn" as if my plan had been foiled. stupid stupid stupid.

then a worse fear came over me. this guy was probably thinking that there was no chance in hell this moron was going to get into any grad school; she couldn't even hit the right button on the atm. i left; devasted.

there is no assumption that i fear more than being assumed to be a moron.

i spent the entire day worrying about it and decided i would go clear up the misconception with the manager the following day. i definitely don't want him to go through life thinking that i'm a moron; i'll probably reassure him i wasn't trying to steal either.

end of scene.

scene two:

when i left teaching lsat class last night at 10pm, a cab driver picked me up in front of the holiday inn, the hotel in which my class is being held this term.

"are you just leaving work?" he asked.

"yes," i replied digging for my cell phone.

silence.

"do you always work this late?"

"just a couple times a week," i said.

it was quiet.

"do you always work at the same hotel?"

"yes," i responded, thinking this was a weird question. then it hit me. this guy thought i was a hooker.

"i'm a teacher," i began.

"... that's an interesting way to put it. what do you teach?"

"the law school admissions test."

it was quiet again. haha. who's the moron now?

"what's on the test?" he asked.

"reading and answering some questions. and types of games."

"games?"

great. this guy first thought i was a hooker at the holiday inn and now thinks i play a mean game of candyland.

when we reached my apartment, i gave him the atm $20 and slipped out of the car as fast as i could.

i guess i'm okay with people thinking i sleep around and teach scrabble. as long as they don't think i'm stupid. afterall, mastering assumptions is what i teach in class, even if i can't master them in the real world.

monday is a crappy way to spend 1/7th of your life.

i once read somewhere that there's actually a scientific explanation behind monday morning blues. our internal clocks naturally operate on a day that is longer than 24 hours. by the time monday rolls around each week, we've built up a sleep deficit of at least an hour.

and if you require as much sleep as i do, you're screwed.

eric, my boyfriend, and i play a game where we rank the days and have to defend our choices when we disagree (can you say law school bound?). we continue to disagree over whether fridays or saturdays are better (he says fridays; i say saturdays), but no matter if you're a student or a professional, a high school teenager or an adult, twentysomething or thirtysomething, it comes down to one thing: mondays suck.

... and i don't mean suck in a good way.

you know that awesome feeling you get when you leave work or your last class on friday afternoon? you know katie holme's breasts (isn't that from a movie or something?)? monday morning is the complete antithesis. in fact, i spend all day sunday dreading monday so much that monday essentially spans into two days instead of one.

at least sunday has desperate housewives and iron chef america.

i spent my entire weekend staring at the computer screen writing essays and filling in grad school applications. want to know a time when my morals were challenged and how i responded? or why harvard, michigan, columbia, u chicago are all my "first choice?" i pounded on my keyboard so much this weekend that they keys are now sticking. wait a minute ...

all i wanted was to go out. to see friends. to grab a drink. to be young. to not worry about the fact that i feel like every word i type hammers a nail into my future. to do anything except stare at a computer screen, because frankly, that's all i do from monday to friday – and i don't enjoy it even when i'm being paid to do it. when i graduated from college, the idea that someone, anyone, was going to pay me to breathe from 9am-5/6pm was a miracle. now i realize i should have been more specific.

i hate getting up the morning.

i hate coming home and being in a bad mood all night.

i hate the weekends because it means that monday morning str just around the corner.

i left college for this?

i spent a lot of time thinking about this over the weekend. want to know the hardest thing about being twenty-something?

it's about attaining an impossible balance.

as a twenty-something, i'm lost between being an adolescent and an adult. i'm lost between college and graduate school. i'm lost between wanting to be young and knowing how important it is to appear like an adult. i'm lost between professions and grad degrees. i'm lost between wanting life to be religiously meaningful and not wanting to think about anything that maybe doesn't even exist. i'm lost between hook ups and marriage. i'm lost between work and play. i'm lost between mondays and fridays.

all in all, i'm lost. and confused. and frustrated.

how does one find meaning in any of this? who has the time?

and really, if i have to figure that out, then why do i also have to spend 14.29% of my life dreading mondays and 14.29% of my life living through them?

**debbierosenbaum.com and twenty-nothing.com will sport a sexy new look in just a few short days. stay tuned**

i've been saving this gem for a rainy day.

okay, so it's not raining ... but anyway.

last week, monk was telling me a story about his accidental encounter with patriotism.

before i continue, i feel like it might be worth explaining who monk is. monk, short for monkey (my pet name for him for a while -- which he hated -- was monkeydoolittle), is a miami boy. like i've said before, no one really picks his/her nickname, except maybe deion. monk looks a little ... well ... like a monkey. but we mean that in the nicest way possible.

on occasion, we'll call him zak. but not because it's short for zachary (his real name), but rather because z.a.k. are his initials (convenient, huh? jen naylor, a girl who should have been my pledge daughter in college goes by jen, which are also conveniently her initials).

i'm not sure why he let us call him monkey, but as we grew out of our adolescence, monkey got shortened to a hipper "monk," and the name has stuck. monk now works two blocks from my office, and yet we only see each other when we're in different cities ... and twice here ... but only by accident.

anyhow.

monk and big mike, another miami boy who now lives in dc (i'm sensing a poker game coming to fruition), set off to play football on a field downtown a couple sundays ago. they decided to drive and park, quite a feat to accomplish in dc but fairly doable on a sunday morning. as they were heading south, they noticed that entire sections of downtown dc were blocked off. apparently, they failed to remember that it was the 11th day of september. who reads the newspaper anyway?

so they rerouted and found a place to park that was as close as they could get to the football game. when they got out of the car, they noticed a lot of people being funneled in a single direction. they just joined in the mass since everyone was heading in the same direction as the football field. after a block or so, monk and mike found themselves, each dressed in a wifebeater with mesh shorts and cleats, in a sea of white shirts and american flags. they politely asked the officer next to the barricades what sports event was drawing so much attention.

sports event? this is the freedom walk.

somehow monk and big mike had involuntarily been "drafted." to the september 11th freedom walk in downtown washington dc.

they tried to slip out of the barricaded streets a couple times, only to be manhandled by the police. "we just want to play football," they argued.

"suuuure you do."

at one point, as monk tells the story, they were surrounded on both sides by protestors. on the left side, naturally, were the anti-war liberals.

"bush is a liar"

"don't a-ttack i-raq"

"you people are sheep-le"

monk took the most offense to that last one. "i am not a sheeple," he mumbled. "i just want to play football." unfortunately, no one really understands monk when he talks.

on the right side of the parade route were the religious fanatics encouraging their little kids to hold up signs that read "g-d hates you."

ahhh. nothing brings together the polar sides of the political spectrum like a good freedom walk.

when monk and mike gave up trying to escape the confines of the freedom walk (quite the irony if you think about it), the parade emptied into a concert on the national mall. except that this concert wasn't just a 9-11 commemorative music instillation. it became a "support our troops" rally, tagged with the clever name of "iraq and roll." iraq and roll? really? are you serious?

monk and mike were finally able to escape freedom and found their football game. they missed the entire first half.

sorry man. see what i said about the dangers of football? (see previous post entitled hail to the victor's girlfriend).

the good news, monk, is that i don't think g-d really hates you, even if the little kids think so.

but you never know. maybe freedom is out and fascism is in.

"Oh, you hate your job? Why didn't you say so? There's a support group for that. It's called EVERYBODY, and they meet at the bar." -Drew Carey

i am "lucky" (lucky?) enough to "work" (work?) for two groups: an organization that does meaningful social justice work and a legislative consulting firm (run by a hispanic jewish gentleman with a dual law and business degree; he's my hero) that was brought on board to help rethink the organization's public relations approach.

when i began my job, i quickly learned that i would ultimately have to pick a team to side with in disagreements. because let's be honest, there is never agreement when it comes to nonprofits; someone always leaves the battlefield with a hurt ego. it's the cardinal rule. except in jewish organizations. then it's the rule of rabbi. we don't have cardinals.

anyway.

at first, i chose to side with the executive director, not because i thought she was right, but because strategically, i hoped to paint the consulting group as unnecessary, get them fired, take on the communications myself and earn my ass a huge raise.

i soon learned that i was playing for the wrong team.

at work, at least.

because at my job, i do not work for the communications department; i am the communications department. and somehow, i'm expected to execute an entire department's effort alone. the consulting group is my primary friend and ally.

somehow, i am expected to do my job and everyone else's. i now write opeds, press releases, newsletters, internal communication updates, grant applications, fundraising materials, advocacy manuals and emails to the board of directors and donors. but only when i'm not redesigning the website, recreating the self-promotion materials, getting speaking gigs at conferences, and setting up newspaper editorial board meetings.

they mistakenly thought that i was superhuman and invincible when they hired me. now i'm paying dearly for my shortcomings.

so i was completely caught off guard when i was asked the ultimate question last week:

"assume it were more manageable -- do you enjoy your job?"

yes.

well, actually. no.

yes.

no.

ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. maybe?

okay really, does anyone?

i guess this question plays into a much bigger question: am i ever going to find a job that makes me happy?

i mean, i know what i like. but i also heard that it's illegal to be paid to do that. maybe i can do that "pro bono" -- if you know what i mean. ::wink:wink::

between you, me, and the however many other people who read this blog, i think i have found something that i actually like to do: i love to write. unfortunately, i'm not sure how a law or business or dual degree will help me, but we'll pretend like they do. otherwise, it means i have to take another grad school admissions test, and i don't think i can afford anymore test-prep classes. even if i do turn around and teach it.

i get up every morning and ask what i'm going to blog about. i fall asleep every night wondering what i'll blog about the next day. i have considered walking around with a reporter's notebook so i can write whenever the urge strikes. this makes eric (my boyfriend) extremely nervous. especially when i begin to furiously scribble on available scrap paper after he has done or said something extraordinarily stupid. fortunately (for him), there is a lag time in which compassion usually overcomes me.

it's just that i like to explore the issues that we're all thinking about, bring them to the surface, bitch about them and hope other people commiserate with me. it's a little like group therapy. except i'm talking to myself. which i suppose is actually grounds for individual therapy.

"i admit it's tempting to wish for the perfect boss ... or the perfect outfit. but maybe the best any of us can do is not quit, play the hand we've been dealt, and accessorize what we've got."

in the meantime, i'll just pretend no one ever asked me the million dollar question and continue complaining about my job.

i guess that's why it's called "work."

and i guess that's why there's alcohol at this thing called "happy hour."

yesterday was the epitome of all mondays.

i got to the curb in time to catch the bus, which proceeded to drive right past me. the metro was overpacked. and i knew that even after working a full day dealing with morons, i still had to teach lsat class to a bunch of capitol hill staffers until 10pm.

anticipating one of those days where you sit down at 9am and work straight through but never really get anything accomplished, i decide to dress comfortably enough to accommodate numb legs from over-sitting, but to "dress up" enough to barely pass as business casual for teaching.

when i got to work at 8:55am, the office manager told me that i would have to attend a conference being hosted by one of our board members. my first attempt to get out of it was "but i have a lot to do today." apparently, colleagues have noticed that i do crossword puzzles and sudokus at my desk.

my second attempt was "but i don't want to go." he told me that i could thumb wrestle or play rock, scissors, paper with a coworker to work it out. knowing my own weaknesses, i vied for a final excuse.

"but i'm not appropriately dressssssed," i whined.

really, i wasn't. i was in see-through white capris (known as "stupid pants" in my house), a black t-shirt, and a corduroy jacket i got at nordstrom's anniversary sale. and my black flip flops. it is now mid-september, and i am pleased to report that have worn sneakers exactly once since the beginning of may. and i only wore them because i went to six flags, and everyone knows you can't wear flip flops on rollercoasters.

"you're fine," the office manager assured me.

so i went. i guess that makes me a pushover. or a sucker. but at least i don't have braces. sorry spirer.

when i got to the conference, our board member was greeting participants at the door. we shook hands (firmly with the arm grab like i was taught) when i approached. he gave me the once over.

"my, my," he said. "i see you got dressed up to see me."

it takes a lot to embarrass me but that just about did it. i replied with some stumbling response that i can't even remember now and slipped out of the conference as soon as i could.

but the incident has left me a little distraught. i love nice clothes. i own more pairs of shoes than i'll ever admit to. so why the hell do i insist on wearing my reef flip flops ... even when i wear suits? and why do i continue to dress like an abercrombie advertisement even though i'm so clearly beyond the age when it's okay to do so?

i suppose that conventional psychology tells us that the manner in which we dress is a nonverbal cue about our personality. but if that were truly the case, then i'd be dressed in something that espouses some mix of anal retentiveness, overachiever and drama queen. a black silk pants suit with diamond buttons and a las vegas headdress maybe?

(you're only laughing because you can actually picture me wearing that.)

but in terms of dressing like an adult, wearing black pants makes me cringe since the days when i learned to associate black pants with snobby girls (see gabe roth's article in stud life from 2002: black pants and other S40 endeavors). and i have always hated suits; i feel like a football player when i wear them. but whenever i dress-to-if-i'm-lucky-impress, it's important for me to incorporate a little "debbie" (and not the snack cake): like when i wear my pinstriped pantsuit, i pair it with a lacy tanktop that unequivocally states "all-business on the outside; all woman on the inside."

but day to day, my take on business dress code is "wear what you can get away with." come to think of it, maybe that says something about my personality too.

i don't know why i can't shake my adolescent-flavored gear. maybe i'm of a generation where fashion is meant as a vehicle for social competition, not for business deals. or maybe it's just me. maybe i'll grow out of it and grow into someone else's shoes. literally.

the one thing i am sure of is that when i am ceo of whatever corporation or am executive director of whatever nonprofit or own my own consulting whatever firm, there will be only one dresscode rule:

when we're seeing clients, you have to wear clothes. otherwise, use your best judgment.

because you can bet i'll still be wearing flip flops.

i have some exciting news.

according to a national survey of sexual behaviors released yesterday by the federal government, slightly more than half of american teenagers ages 15 to 19 have engaged in oral sex.

in honor of such information, today i am sporting my "i heart pro-choice boys" shirt.

wow. 54 percent?

gosh that sucks for just less than half of american teenagers.

many people (including me) argue that the number is probably higher because many young adults are not forthcoming with their sexual activity.

one can only hope.

the good news for guys who partake of lesbionage (the act of spying on lesbians) is that the study also found that one in seven young women reported having at least one homosexual experience in her lifetime, up from 4% in a similar survey conducted in 1992. that means gather seven of your heterosexual female friends in a room; one of them is lying.

in addition to the fact that i consider anything relating to oral sex worth talking about -- it's my favorite topic of discussion and percussion -- what makes this study even more fabulous is the political conundrum that it presents.

on one hand (pardon the pun), an increase in oral sex means greater risks of gonorrhea, syphilis, genital herpes and human papillomavirus, in which not even progressives can find favor. on the other hand, the data also suggest that there is a rise in cunnilingus activity, giving women for the first time an equal stake in oral sex. (it's about time the phrase "'tis better to give than to receive" got some leverage.)

so here's the dilemma: stds are bad. but the study is also an indicator of the advancement of women's equality in society.

so the conundrum: does one endorse or condone oral sex based on this study? Because for a lot of organizations and people, this study isn't about sex and oral sex. it's about women's rights -- women and girls becoming more sexually confident.

"it calls into question the stereotype of boys as hunters and girls as prey," said james wagoner, president of advocates for youth, a washington-based reproductive health organization.

he's right; i've been saying that for years. unfortunately, the reporters didn't call me for a quote.

and i suppose that even if we can't have comparable wages in the workplace, at least we have voting and oral sex.

and really, does equality get any better than that?

i am completely, without a doubt, 100%, overwhelmed, underwhelmed, frustrated, upset and on the verge of tears.

tonight i attended an mba event hosted by some little ivy league university that no one has probably ever heard of. the idea was for the school to discuss its program and the few minor requirements for admission: you know, a 7 million on the gmat, a 3.99 gpa and a life tragedy that makes you unique.

so in addition to feeling completely miserable, now i'm inadequate too.

turns out that having a good gpa, a solid gmat score and applying hispanic isn't enough to get me into business school. if only the world was that shallow...

so it comes down to this: either i'm just really messed up or a lot of twenty-somethings do a good job pretending like they know what they want to do with the rest of their lives.

the admissions guy told us that schools want to know what we plan to do with the degree in the short term and the long run. are they kidding? i don't know what i'm doing tomorrow night.

fortunately, i remembered to dust off my suit this morning (although i forgot to use the lint roller so i might have still had remnants of cat hair), which helped me feel like i played the role of stuffy business school student. i also remembered to drag around a copy of the wall street journal (which i get for free) all day and strategically read it as we were waiting for the session to begin. brilliant. i assumed they would see that and accept me on the spot.

except that 4 other prospectives were reading it too. assholes.
it was my idea first.

i tried really hard to pay attention as the guy was talking about how great the program at his no-name school is, but just couldn't (this does not bode well for grad school). i kept staring down at the sudoku puzzle that i didn't have time to do earlier in the day (this work thing is killing me). after peeking down and looking up and peeking down and looking up and peeking down and looking up, trying to appear interested while doing the sudoku in my head, i decided to screw pretending and did the puzzle. i'm glad he talked for a while because it was a "hard" one -- a triple jedi ninja as it would have been rated in chicago's newspapers.

we were given the opportunity to stick around and talk to some alumni after the session had ended. as i looked around the room, i realized that despite all the shit i talk about being excited to go back to school(s), the thought of starting over -- making friends and making small talk with a lot of law school nerds and business school egos -- makes me nauseous. push comes to shove (don't tell anyone): i'm shy. i waited until 5 other kids left the room before i slipped out the door.

i ran into the kid the kid i randomly sat next to at the session in the elevator at my apartment. and he lives on the same floor as me. either it was one of those fabulous life coincidences ... or i was being stalked.

and as i sit here, i realize that i've been complaining about applications for over a month now, and really, i'm not any further along. for the first time in my life, i'm literally paralyzed with fear.
after tonight's single-school fiasco, guess who's excited for the mba fair next week with over 400 schools in attendance?

... thank g-d i haven't attended any law school information sessions.

i was a sophomore in college when the two towers came down in new york.

(bare with me -- this blog isn't necessarily funny. but in an effort to live up to the "devilishy witty, heart-warming and smart" endorsement quote i aim to get from oprah or dave sedaris, i'm going to try to be poignant. we'll return to our regularly scheduled sarcasm tomorrow.)

i had a psych of adolescence class that morning at 10am (midwestern "we're just a little slow" time). i went to class even though i knew about both plane crashes, because that's just what debbie does -- she goes to school come hell or high water. or terrorist attack.

in the first five minutes, someone raised his hand and asked if we could watch the news instead of listening to a lecture. the professor replied, "you'll be hearing about what happened this morning for the rest of your life. you only get psych of adolescence once." so we had class.

and in all four years of college, it is the only time i regret not playing hookie.

i would venture to guess that nearly every graduation keynote address since 9/11 has been about the repercussions and meaning of that day -- especially because we were all in college and away from home when the world as we knew it changed.

but what strikes me is that beginning this year, the graduating university students won't have even been in college when the attacks happened. most of them went home from school that day to be in the company of family. most of them couldn't even vote yet.

don't get me wrong: today's twenty-somethings are the 9/11 generation. all of us -- whether or not we were actually in some sort of institution of higher learning or not. but certainly for those of us who were away from home, it was a defining moment of our adulthood. we found family among our peers. we felt a surge of patriotism. we were scared. we were angry. we put up disgusted away messages (because really, that's how our generation expresses itself best). we promised to never forget.

here we are 4 years later. and in the words of gabe, "i'm kinda over it."

disclaimer: no, i don't think either of us is over 9/11; i'm not sure we'll ever be. but what i mean is that i think i'd rather be remembered in history as the pro-active generation, not as the reactive generation.

thomas friedman (who gave our commencement address) notes two dates in history that have changed the political, social and cultural landscapes: 11/9 and 9/11. on 11/9/89, the berlin wall came down. on 9/11/01, the two towers came down. he argues that both events required great amounts of creativity and imagination. but the sources of creativity came from very different ideals: one from great hope and one from great hatred.

and that's why we can't let 9/11 be the defining moment of our generation. surely, it has changed us. but so has rap. and instant messenger. and steve madden. and music piracy. and tivo. and dawson's creek.

i'd like to think that we are not a creative generation of great hatred. we are an imaginative generation of great hope.

we feel a strong pull to be connected to each other: whether through im, email or cell phone. our generation has been given unprecedented means to connect with each other and the world.

for us, knowledge is power. and it's cool to be smart.

(which might be the only basis on which i could be considered cool.)

granted, we are lazy as all hell, and we think that using a thesaurus means shift+f7 and that writing in cursive means changing the font to monotype corsiva. and we have short attentio...

... but we are curious. we are smart. we are efficient. we are confident (albeit sometimes cocky). we are self-reliant. we are self-sufficient. we are passionate. we are innovators. we are driven.

we don't want to know what; we want to know how. we shouldn't be known as "generation y" but rather "generation why?"

we are a generation of enormous imagination and creativity, and it's in the way that we choose to use it that will ultimately define us. but we should never be defined by the moment in which our pride was destroyed and our sense of immortality was shattered. (that does not include the moments we've been rejected at a bar).

we are a generation of so much more than that. we are the generation of facebook and mozilla. of hybrid cars and ipods. of napster and digital cable. of ebonics and lol, omg and ttyl. of flip flops and jonathan safran foer.

don't doubt what we are capable of.

but don't judge us based on "the real world" or "the bachelor." hey, no one's perfect.

dear loyal readers,

the worst thing happened today: they made me actually do work at my job, which has barred me from writing a thoughtful, meaningful and probably demeaning blog post. i thought i'd complain to the management but then i realized that they don't pay me to write my own thoughts. they pay me to write other people's. sigh.

but, while i have a second, i wanted to acknowledge the fact that at each turn in my life, i am learning that there are more and more of you readers (suckers) out there. as the number of readers rise, i am pursuaded to write more. so (insert shameless plug here) i encourage you to pass along the website domain to your friends/coworkers/cohorts -- as long as they aren't my coworkers.

the more, the better. (that's what he said.)

just last weekend, i ran into some friends from college who i haven't seen since graduation. the conversation went:

debbie: "hey! what's going on in your life?"
alyson, emily and liz: (insert some reply here)

silence.

alyson, emily and liz: "ummm. we don't have to ask you what's going on in your life because we read your blog."

oh.

i'm not one for small talk anyway.

your verbal support has been overwhelmingly encouraging, and for those willing to send me an endorsement quote for my blog or pending book, i will throw a kick-back to once i'm published or famous -- whichever comes first.

but, as an attempt to use this blog as a forum for education in addition to making fun of people, i will at least provide you with something worth reading today: one of my all time favorite New York Times articles.

A Critic Takes On the Logic of Female Orgasm
By DINITIA SMITH
Published: May 17, 2005
http://www.etaiwannews.com/Perspective/2005/05/19/1116467659.htm

that is all.

please drive thru.

"You'll see when you move out it just sort of happens one day and it's just gone. And you can never get it back. It's like you get homesick for a place that doesn't exist. I mean it's like this rite of passage, you know. You won't have this feeling again until you create a new idea of home for yourself, you know, for you kids, for the family you start; it's like a cycle or something. I miss the idea of it. Maybe that's all family really is. A group of people who miss the same imaginary place." - Garden State

deion called me last night, devastated.

had deion called monk (zak), i imagine monk would have asked if "someone had run over his cat."

deion, a new law student and resident of pittsburgh, informed me that his parents called to let him know they were thinking of selling his house and moving away from miami.

the news hit hard. someone might as well have run over his cat.

fortunately, simba is okay. deion, however, is not.

i spent a few minutes on the phone trying to console an inconsolable deion. just as a frame a reference: when deion is upset, his voice goes up about an octave and even though we are currently separated by some 250 miles, i could see deion stomping around his apartment, arms swinging, yelling at inanimate objects.

that's just what deion does.

when i got off the phone, i tried to explain the situation to the boyfriend who had overheard part of the conversation. for outsiders, the logical response is, "well if you don't live with your parents anymore, then it's not your house. you have your own life. they have theirs. you can't dictate where they live or what they do."

clearly, these outsiders just don't understand.

in high school, there was a group of about 10 or 12 of us who were inseparable -- the "pack of wolves" i often refer to. all guys ... and me. other girls and girlfriends came and went; a couple have since stuck around. i am really the only one who has been "one of the boys" since day one ... when lax tried to get with me at a bbyo (youth group) convention ... until today ... when lax is still trying to get with me. (just kidding; he has a girlfriend.)

i can't talk about high school without talking about The Boys; for me, the two are inseparable. we spent endless afternoons on the boat in biscayne bay. we slept at each other's houses on the weekends. we played football or basketball nearly every sunday morning (okay. they played. but i was always, always on the sideline). we ate dinner most nights at wendy's or texas taco factory or the food court in dadeland. we played spades and poker until 3 in the morning. we threw killer parties too.

and when we're at home together now, nothing has changed. (albeit there is considerably more facial hair.)

i think that our friendship can best be described as a cross between the one smalls, squints, ham and yeah-yeah have in the sandlot and the one the corleone family has in the godfather: we talk about sports and hot chicks; but don't you dare go against the family.

the thing about high school friendships is that most fall apart as soon as everyone starts to go in different directions in their twenty-somethings. i distinctly remember a conversation between my older sister and me as i left for freshman year of college. she told me that i shouldn't cry over leaving because, ultimately, my high school friends wouldn't really still be my closest friends once i graduated.

she couldn't have been more wrong.

the truth is that we do live in different cities. and we do have different life aspirations. and most of us don't know where we'll wind up in the end. but we do have one thing: we have our miami connection.

some of us are already practicing law, some of us are just starting grad school, some of us are working, some of us didn't make it through college. some of us are still in miami, some of us live in different cities but close to one another, some of us live in places where the miami-crew reputation doesn't precede us (which is rare, by the way).

for those significant others, close friends or roommates who have tried to befriend the "miami crew," they understand how difficult we are to break into. we're not exclusive; just cliquey.

it's a family thing.

here we are. 9+ years later, and while we live in different cities, have different boyfriends/girlfriends and have experienced different situations, we are still the first ones to dance at each others' weddings, cry with each others' sorrows, and laugh at each others' misfortunes.

but the one thing we have that brings us together, no matter where we are or whom we're with -- is our home. we are family not because we have a house with four walls and a hispanic housekeeper; but because we are a "group of people who miss the same place."

as our parents begin to migrate in the opposite direction of the rest of the jews in this country -- away from florida instead of towards it -- we begin to feel the ground beneath us slipping.

it's not that our bond will become any less elitist (okay, we are a little exclusive); it's that our bond is regenerated every time we make fun of cheeks for being fat or deion for being short or lax for being loud or monk for mumbling or the fines for sharing a piece of gum or dean for driving recklessly or allan for being mexican or stern for being annoying or spirer for having braces or me for being -- a girl.

and that's why it's a big deal for some of us when some of our biological families decide to move away from miami. because no matter in what city each of us ultimately chooses to buy a house, settles down and has kids (gasp), a lot of us feel like we only have one true home. sure, there are couches to chill on and extra beds to crash on, but it's significance is much greater as we grow closer to the end of our first decade together.

it means that we're at the end of our beginnings.

we just worry about the beginning of the end.

because for us, growing up means never growing apart.

i love football season.

not so much because i love football, which i enjoy on occasion, but more because i love the fact that i now have saturdays to myself.

witnessing the effects that college football season has on my boyfriend eric is a phenomenon. i mean, wash u had a football team (i think). but i can't remember if they ever played. we did have a kick-ass girls' basketball team if that counts for anything.

to most big-ten schools, it doesn't.

i was awakened this morning by the "wolverine call," which sounds a lot like eric pacing around the living room making calls to every single michigan alum he knows living in washington, dc to see if he/she would be at the michigan bar. apparently today is a big game.

michigan bar to watch football? don't they know it's on tv?

maybe wash u has a bar for its alumni to go watch spelling bees and quiz bowls.

i mean, don't get me wrong. i love a good miami-uf game or a good dolphins-patriots game, and i'll follow both teams' wins and losses throughout the season without watching every single game. and i'm still more likely to kick back on the couch and watch a good football game than my little brother is. but honestly, i'd rather watch a good competition between iron chef morimoto and iron chef sakai.

when i whined to let him know he woke me up, eric came into the bedroom, decked out in almost all the Michigan paraphernalia he had. okay, it was just a hat and a shirt, but there's a chance he had a golden "m" painted on his chest that i didn't catch before he left.

he paced around the room while i was waking up, a habit he does when he's nervous.

"what's wrong?" i asked.

"i just don't want to forget anything," he replied.

"newsflash, sweetheart. you're not playing in the game," i teased.

"i know. but i want to be prepared in case they're down and they look to me and say, 'eric, we need you to come in and play quarterback.'"

oh right. i forgot. every man's dream.

eric continued to pace. he also informed me that he put himself on the waiting list for michigan football season tickets, which i learned are obtained only by donating serious cash to the athletic department. when i looked at him skeptically, he took about ten minutes to explain why it was a good financial investment.

he further reminded me that he would either be in a really good mood or a really bad mood later. he's not kidding. eric's mood for the next couple months will almost solely be determined by what happens on saturdays.

and he has made it clear that he will never ever ever ever become a religious jew. "if g-d wanted me to be religious, he wouldn't have made michigan football on saturdays."

football does crazy things to people.

eric also made me join him in a "hail to the victors" cheer before he left -- and made me do it again when i forgot the words.

maybe it's just something i don't fully understand since i never attended a college with a huge football team. so i'll indulge him. i'll even go to the michigan bar to support eric-the-quarterback when they play ohio state. and he's right: it's kind of fun.

but in the meantime, i have saturdays all to myself.

go 'canes.

i'm not a bitch. i've just been in a bad mood for the last week.

(okay. i've been in a "bad mood" a lot longer than that.)

while some might venture to attribute my recent bad mood to nature, i just think that twenty-somethings should be given a "bad mood" pass. kinda like the hall passes from elementary school. but better.

these come with alcohol.

i'm drowning at work. i'm getting pressure to stay overtime at my other job. i haven't finished my personal statement (and by finished, i mean started). i haven't even looked at my business school applications. i haven't added to my book-in-progress in weeks. i can't concentrate at work because i probably spend too much time writing for this blog. for someone as busy as i am, i have no clue why i have so much left to do.

granted, i can tell you what happened on every episode of "entourage" this season (the bat-mitzvah episode is the best) and name the contestants left on "so you think you can dance" (blake, jamile, artem, nick, ryan, ashle, destini, kamilah, melissa, and melody -- my favorite).

this sort of slacker behavior would have been completely unacceptable in college. those were the days when i had shit done before anyone ever asked me to do it. i reminded people to do things before they even knew they were delegated the responsibility. i was in meetings more hours a week than i was in class. and i still slept half a dozen or more hours a night. i wasn't just ahead of the game; i was there, did what i needed to do, and left a bouquet of flowers before the game schedule was even set.

if you've ever made the transition from higher education to the professional world, you've probably noticed how much slower the real world runs. some boss needs a three page memo in two weeks. two weeks?! he can have it tomorrow: and that still gives me time to screw around all day -- i'll do it tonight.

if college kids ran the world, everything would get done so much faster, only a few nerds would be sober and a lot more people would be getting some ass.

alas, i'm a victim of the professional world. i can't even throw some applications together or concentrate long enough to write a couple thoughtful op-ed pieces. they might as well fail me out of grad school now.

in retrospect, there were times in college when i would feel like i was destined for failure. and i guess i mostly prevailed. but i would always crawl into my bed and throw the covers over my head, convinced there was no light at the end of the tunnel.

and it's times like these when gabe and spi would bust open my door and tell me to get the fuck out of bed; we were going out.

well spi and gabe aren't here to tell me to shut up, get up and go kick some ass.

so i'm taking my bad mood and burying myself in my covers.

but i can hear them in my head bitching already.

i guess those are the best kinds of friends.

...assholes.

there's an elephant in the room.

... or on this blog.

he doesn't fly. he doesn't have big ears. and his name isn't dumbo or jumbo or peanuts.

while i aim to use this forum as a soapbox to write about the issues of the twenty-something generation, the recent past, albeit highlighted by beautiful and celebratory events, has also been laden with destruction. (mmmmm, j.ladon)

as i sit at my desk, i can't help but think of anything else. i feel compelled to write about it, not because i have anything more insightful to say than anyone else, but because as far as i can see, coping and dealing with death is as much a part of growing up as anything else is.

grad school. sex. marriage. jobs. death. dating. politics. one big happy category. but not necessarily in that order.

so much has been written about the acute loss from hurricane katrina. and the loss of chief justice rehnquist. and the cell phone towers were bumpin' last night as our friends coalesced to pass around the news of a loss experienced by a close friend.

when the news of rehnquist's death became public, the part of the country that likes its civil rights and personal freedoms cringed. at a press conference the next day, the president announced that, since the news of his passing, rehnquist was still dead.

i might not have liked rehnquist's politics, but if he "could forgive anything in a person except being humorless," then maybe he's okay in my book. and while his death may leave the death of civil liberties pending, there have been some gains.

take roberts, the nominee for supreme court chief justice, for example. not only was the harvard law grad nominated weeks ago for one of the nine most prestigious positions in this country, but he also just got a raise -- and he wasn't even hired yet.

talk about being in the right place at the right time. i consider myself at the right place at the right time when i actually catch the bus in the morning.

and he gets a bigger chair than the other eight.

but personal loss is so much more complicated. it hurts. it sucks. but it's part of the human experience; the ability to reach through our own isolation and find strength, comfort, and warmth for and within each other at times of loss is what humanity is all about. somehow, knowing all that never makes it any easier.

but the funny thing about death is that it also brings out life.

when i was in 7th grade, i lost two grandparents (one from each side) and the closest thing i'd ever had to a fairygodmother all within 10 days. when "grandparent's day" was the following week at my school, my homeroom teacher called my mom to tell her not to send me to school that day. that's humanity.

when katrina hit miami prior to annihilating gomorrah, the destruction that my mom described in my suburb overwhelmed me. for whatever reason, memories came flooding back -- pardon the term -- from my experience during hurricane andrew in 1992.

great. now i'm having post traumatic stress disorder and post partum depression (**see correction note on yesterday's blog and reprinted below). i suppose these are the disadvantages of being an abnormal psych major.

anyway, i had dreams for 3 nights in a row about being stuffed in my mom's closet with my sister, brother, dog, hamsters, and 4 cats. (quite the food chain if you think about it; fortunately, no one was eaten. not even my little brother.) my sister and i played dress up with my mom's wardrobe (think neon colors from the 80's) to pass the time. we might have lip-synched too.

i think that during times of loss and death and destruction, it's easier to deal when distracted.

so last night when the "miami-transplanted-to-dc-crew" hit up the marlins/nationals baseball game, we went to donate our extra tickets to the new orleans refugees who had been bussed into dc earlier that day. only to find that they had more tickets than they had refugees.

humanity isn't just about donating money and clothes and tampons.

it's also about baseball.

... and it doesn't get anymore human than that.





**correction 9/8/05: Dr. Rosenbaum (the one who wears stilletos to the hospital) called me to say that it can't be "post partum depression" - which i already knew, but was trying to make a point. she insists that i correct it to the appropriate medical term: "post fun event depression."**

i hate my birthday.

(no, today isn't my birthday, nor is it next week. you didn't forget it, but it would have been okay if you did: i don't like it and you don't have to either.)

i have not really liked my birthday since after the days when other moms used to bring in supermarket cupcakes for our preschool classes. but even then, this overachiever was never satisfied with offering my peers the option of "vanilla cupcake or chocolate cupcake?"

the night before my birthday, my mom and i would always make something that i was sure no one else would ever bring in: toll house cookie pie, ice cream cone swirl cupcakes with homemade cream cheese frosting, double chocolate chip peanut butter walnut bars. and i think one year i convinced her to make both gourmet applecake and martha stewart rice krispy treats (see recipe below; they're the bomb).

like i said. i've always been an overachiever. and competitive ... more competitive than you.

(by the way, i'm convinced that my adolescent and adult obsession with box yellow cake sans icing is a direct result of my childhood dessert snobbishness.)

but anyway.

around the year i turned 6 and every year forward, my parents would offer to "buy me off," a proposition any future business school student would agree to: instead of spending the money to throw a party for some snot-nosed kids in my class, my parents would give me the money to buy whatever i could budget. you think i had friends because i was a nice kid or because i had the coolest toys?

one could attribute my continued lack of interest in annual birthday celebration to this notion, but i'd like to propose something else:

post partum depression.

hear me out.

i had been looking forward to cheeker's wedding for months. my friends and i had been talking, planning, thinking, arranging, preparing, dreaming ... and complaining, fighting, arguing, bickering, quarreling and bitching about the weekend for almost a year. every time we were together, it was the topic of conversation (unless we were around someone who wasn't invited; then we would still talk about it, but in secret code). before i ever stepped on a plane to atlanta, i knew every outfit i would wear down to the hair clip and panties.

and now that it's over, i'm kind of sad.

sure there are a whole bunch more weddings for friends-who-are-foolish-enough-to-want-to-get-married coming up, all of which i'm excited to take part in and to attend (and drink at). but there's nothing like "the first" -- if you know what i mean.

frankly, i'm having post partum depression.**

not so much for having to let cheeks go (i like his new wife lynne, and let's be honest: as a new associate at one of the biggest law firms in miami, they're not really going anywhere). i'm having separation anxiety from the wedding weekend. it was just something that had been so hyped up ... and now ... it's over.

which is precisely why i've never looked forward to my birthday. i don't dislike my birthday so much as i hate the feeling of normality the day afterwards -- a lesson i learned even as a little kid.

last weekend has also left me concerned about my own status as a twenty-something. if all my friends are getting married, how come i don't feel ready yet? what am i so afraid of? don't i have the rest of my life to be married?

maybe i'm just waiting until i'm a little older so my friends will be more well-established and will able to buy me nicer wedding presents.

... and birthday presents too. because with law school and business school tuitions, my parents can't afford to buy me off forever.

**correction 9/8/05: Dr. Rosenbaum (the one who wears stilletos to the hospital) called me to say that it can't be "post partum depression" - which i already knew, but was trying to make a point. she insists that i correct it to the appropriate medical term: "post fun event depression."**


----------------------------------------------
Confetti Squares
Props to Martha Stewart

9 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 teaspoon salt
12 cups (2 1/2 bags) miniature marshmallows
6 cups Rice Krispies cereal
6 cups Cap'n Crunch cereal
6 cups Froot Loops cereal
Vegetable-oil cooking spray

1. Lightly spray a 9-by-9-by-2-inch baking pan with vegetable-oil cooking spray; set aside. Melt butter in a large pot over medium heat. Add salt and marshmallows; stir with a wooden spoon until melted. Remove from heat. Add Rice Krispies, Cap'n Crunch, and Froot Loops, and stir until combined.

2. Transfer the mixture to the prepared pan. To prevent sticking, coat your hands with vegetable spray, and press the mixture evenly into the pan. Let cool, about 30 minutes.

3. Cut into 3-by-3-inch bars. Store in an airtight container for up to 3 days.

i assaulted my liver. i cracked my head open. i wounded my lungs. i destroyed my stomach. i fried my hair. i have bruises on my legs. i passed out in the bath. i learned how to plump up my lips by applying quasi-poisonous herbs. i watched one of my favorite people ever give up his life to the marriage plague.

... nevertheless, it was one of the best weekends ever.

i suppose that being so upset/nervous/overwhelmed by the fact that so many of my twenty-something friends are getting married in the next twelve months has eclipsed the real possible opportunities here: intense partying, phenomenal celebration, memory construction, of course, excessive drinking.

(come to think of it, these might be the everyday hallmarks of the twenty-something generation.)

the deion/lax extravaganza weekend was only "interrupted" once by cheeks and lynne getting married on sunday night. a few weekend highlights include:

• cheeks fell asleep at the strip club during his bachelor party.
• dean took us the "scenic" route around the entire atlanta beltway for 2 hours to get from the airport to the hotel in dekalb -- a 20 minute drive for the general public. he also took us the scenic route (albeit a little less scenic) on the way back. and dropped us off at the wrong terminal.
• spirer, the only 24 year-old i know with them, walked around showing everyone his new braces. he also puffed out his chest and asked every bridesmaid if she wanted to see his "guns."
• we took a secret trip to willy's burritos for real food during the friday night shabbat dinner.
• one of the guys was mistaken for a waiter at ruth's chris steak house.
• i went on a shopping outing with a group of cool-enough-to-be-invited-but-not-cool-enough-to-be-in-the-actual-wedding people.
• deion and lax, the best men, went for manicures and pedicures. deion might be well-versed at mani's and pedi's, but asian nail salons are a new adventure for our hero lax. during his pedicure, when the lady told him to soak his feet in the water, lax must have misheard that for "be-sure-to-drench-both-me-and-half-the-salon."

and while i think the vast majority of us had an all around great time, perhaps the drama of the weekend can best be expressed through the as-only-debbie-does-episodes.

friday night, after a few/a lot of (who's counting?) drinks, i leaned over to turn off the light when i had an encounter with the nightstand. upon the collision of its corner and my head, i thought, "boy, am i glad i'm drunk. otherwise, that would have really really hurt." i leaned back to watch tv when i noticed that my pillow was soaked in blood. turns out that the in celebrity death match between the nightstand and me, woody-the-nightstand won.

at the mall, i was introduced to "lip venom," a new lip-gloss laced with chinese herbs that are intended to irritate ones lips and send blood rushing to them, thereby producing a fuller, sexier and naturally-rosey-lip look. turns out that purposefully inflaming your lips isn't so healthy for you, but it looks really hot.

saturday night, after a few/a lot of (who's counting?) drinks, i wound up drinking 4 red bulls in lieu of alcohol between 10pm and 11:30pm. turns out that 4 am isn't so fun when no one else is awake.

preparing for the wedding, someone thought it would be really funny to see happens if one puts the two most un-girly-girls together to do their hair. turns out that lisa wound up with illustrious bouncy curls; i fried off a bunch of my hair.

sunday night, after a few ... okay, after a whole lot of drinks (no one was counting -- not even me), i wound up gracing the dance floor with the hora and then gracing the toilet with my face. but i didn't just have an oops-i-drank-too-much-and-threw-up evening; i had a full-out, passed-out, incoherent episode -- far surpassing any college or high school drinking extravaganza. i fell asleep in a bathtub full of water. i dry-heaved for hours. i couldn't answer simple questions like "what's your name?" "where were you born?" "what's the quadratic equation?" and "why do you want a dual law/mba degree?" (which i might point out is an unfair question: i can't answer that when i'm sober either).

turns out that overdrinking and missing a lot of your friends' wedding reception really isn't fun.

being twenty-something is as much about living as it is about learning.

it is as much about maturing as it is about regressing.

it is as much about screwing up as it is about growing up.

and i think we all discover that really good friends are the ones who cry at our weddings, rescue us from danger and laugh with us ... even when it's not funny.

(weekend pictures c/o smaya at: http://www.snapfish.com/share/p=9051125972148594/l=59199137/cobrandOid=1000131/otsc=SYE/otsi=SALB)

i have a confession to make.

this week, i have been vacillating between maintaining and shutting down this blog. it's time-consuming. it's pissed off a good number of people. it's offending many of my friends. it's readership has been diminishing. it's "below me" according to some sources. and it's difficult to bring humor to a lot of the 20-something issues that are profoundly unfunny. any logical person would walk away from something that causes so much grief.

fortunately (or unfortunately), i'm not logical.

and i kind of like it here.

and yesterday there were a couple signs from g-d who mentioned that i should continue to write my book and blog about my life -- but only once i was finished with my homework. he said something about it being good for me to "talk about my feelings" (which i don't do well) and that it might pay off in the long run.

well ... the conversation wasn't that in depth, but i got the message. (by the way, how come when one speaks to g-d, he's considered religious, but when one hears g-d speak to him, he's considered crazy?)

i was forwarded an e-mail from downstairs-amy yesterday about a local tv program looking for "dc area twentysomethings who are struggling with twentysomethingy issues: people who maybe don't know what to do with their lives, are lost when it comes to a career path or other young adult issues, are trying to deal with living with their parents or simply relating to them, etc etc. if anyone is interested in voicing their thoughts/ defending twentysomethings/explaining what it's really like to be a young adult today, please email us."

what they really should have wrote was, "ummm... we're looking for debbie rosenbaum. if anyone knows how to get in touch with her, could you let us know?"

so for now, the blog stays. i can't promise it will always be funny. i can't promise it will always be profound. i can't promise that i won't try to make other people laugh at your expense. i certainly can't promise that i won't be offensive or curse a litfucktle bit.

["i can't promise i wont make comments about your sexual preference or your ethnicity, but i promise to always apologize" --ari gold, entourage]

but i can promise you that this is me. these are our stories. take it or leave it.

... well, you can't really "take me" or "leave me." but sexual favors are encouraged.

i'll continue to complain and rave about my jobs. i'll continue to glorify and bitch about my friends. i'll continue talk about loving and making fun of my family. i'll continue to be overwhlemed and kick my own ass about grad school admissions (still no personal statement; beginning crisis stage shortly). and i'll definitely continue to worry about relationships, marriage, career paths, grad school degrees and whether or not i'm normal. (i'm not).

oh, and i have another confession to make.

in november 2000, i didn't vote in the most controversial state in the most controversial election our country has ever seen. i swear i tried to vote in 2004; they just lost my ballot.

... but that's another story. just had to get it off my chest while we were doing the whole confession thing.