When I saw this the first time....

...I would love to say that I thought:

• "Typical! Another example of the patriarchy objectifying women!"
  or
• "Wow - I should show this to every girl I know to show them how official beauty is constructed."
  or
• "This is disgusting - we should boycott all makeup brands until they stop this shit."

But no, what I really thought, the first time I saw this clip was:

"Wow! I want them to do that to me!"

(In my defense, I did think the other thoughts when I watched it for the second, third and fourth time...)

Sorry for the silence...updated

Yes, I've been busy. And actually a little worn down by all this inconvenient truth biting me in the ass.

• I went back to the hardware store and located the correct type of light bulbs and now I have replaced the front porch light, the back porch lights, the lights in my kitchen and bedroom, the lights in our bedside lamps and the light in the living room lamp. I read that the light cast by the energy-efficient bulbs can be a little harsh - they are in effect, fluorescent tubes - but I must say I've been impressed with it. It doesn't make me look any more hideous than normal. And I actually like the light it casts in the bedroom, which has always been a bit gloomy. So, ironically, I'm actually using the lights in the bedroom more. Great.
  
• I have been using the basin insert into the sink and not running the water so much which makes me feel all supercilious and smug. At least while I'm washing the dishes.
  
• Man of the House (snerk!) has made enquiries about solar hot water systems. About $4000 to install but will pay for itself in about 5 years, provided it doesn't have that charming 'inbuilt obsolescence' feature common to most household appliances and it craps itself 4 years and 364 days after installation. We need to figure out how to work that into the household"budget" (double snerk!!). But I think we'll go ahead with that sooner rather than later. We'll go hungry but at least we'll be clean.
  
• Prius...no, haven't gone there yet.
  
• I have caught the train to work and the bus back once a week for the past two weeks and it wasn't awful - because I don't go to work in peak time, I always get a seat and it's always amusing to see what the young'uns are wearing these days.
  
• I haven't tackled the phone thing yet. A friend told me that the phone company will supply a non-electrical phone if you go ask them for one and I could just get rid of the answering machine altogether which is a possibility as no one calls me anyway or knows to get a hold of me on the mobile. The jury is still out...

So - not all bad. I'm still trying to work my brain out of the "too little, too late" mental patterning. I have to believe that all these little things will make a difference. Look at what chaos those damned butterflies in the Amazon can cause with one wing flutter...damn those butterflies and their wing-flapping ways!

What I have done so far...

I went to the hardware store this morning and bought up on energy-efficient light bulbs and have installed 6 so far that have just required me to stand on a kitchen chair to replace. Anything that requires a ladder is beyond me as I do not own a ladder, but I do 'own' a 6'2" husband who is the next best thing...

Of course I dropped one, shattering it into a million pieces. The child says to me: "Silly Mama" which is the latest phrase that is uttered a bazillion times a day. I should have said, "I'm doing this for your future, sunshine!" but the fact of the matter is that it was a little silly of me to try to balance on a rickety kitchen chair on an uneven porch to change the light bulb. Damn these kids with their know-all ways!

And then I discovered that some of my light fittings are bayonets and others are screw in types. So I have to go back to the hardware store to get the different types. And buy a replacement for the one I shattered. So I'm only going to use a tank of petrol to get this all right...sigh...

I know there is a "How many Picky Bitches does it take to change a light bulb?"-joke in all this somewhere but I just can't think of a decent punch-line. I'll leave that up to you...

Something I've done already that I've been meaning to do for ages...

Our mailbox used to have a 'No Junk Mail' sticker on it that fell off at some point and I've been meaning to get a new one. I must admit that since becoming a mother, the crappy supermarket specials brochures would get me all excited to see who would have nappies on sale that week.

Well - no more. Forget the sticker - I couldn't wait until the stores were open - so I took to my letter box with a permanent marker and wrote: NO JUNK MAIL PLEASE (at least I said 'please') all over it. It looks totally classy and not 'white-trashy' at all!

But this is what gets me about the 'no junk mail' thing. Aren't those flyers already all printed? Does it really have an effect to ask to not have them? Don't the people stuffing them in mailboxes just ditch the ones left over? Is there another way to make my point? Should I be collecting them and sending them back (C.O.D.) to the store headquarters? Has anyone ever approached these chains about starting up a mailing list to be notified of weekly specials by email? I wouldn't mind that. It would make a change from being asked to enlarge my penis on a daily basis. Maybe I will call Supermarket HQ and suggest it? They all came on board about the plastic bag reduction thing - maybe this could be their next step.

The Spell Check prompted 'flyer' as a misspelling suggesting 'flier' so I looked it up on dictionary.com and it accepts both spellings - probably an American thing. It also informed me that a 'flyer' in Australian language (that obscure off-shoot of the Mother Tongue) is an 'exceptionally swift kangaroo' - who knew?

Earth in the balance

Tonight I finally went to see An Inconvenient Truth and felt I really had to get some thoughts out there. I wouldn't say it was enjoyable - it wasn't Little Miss Sunshine - more like Little Miss Radiation, really - I cried in the car all the way home. But I am trying to take on board something that Al Gore said in the movie that seemed to be summing up all that I was feeling. And to paraphrase, he said something like: in the face of all this data, a lot of people will jump straight from denial into despair, without stopping to ask what they can do to change things.

So, even though I did sob all the way home, I was also trying to think of ways to make changes. So I'm putting them out there as a matter of public record. If anyone happens to stumble across this blog, feel free to nag me about whether I've done what I am about to say I will do.

Things I feel I can do to not only assuage a guilty conscience, but hopefully make a difference:

• Replace the lightbulbs in the house with energy-efficient bulbs. I will not swap out the bathroom bulbs - it's one of those 4 in one deals with heat lamps but I will not use the heat lamps except in winter and only for the kids' baths.
• Track down a push-button or rotary dial phone and disconnect my electric phone and answering machine. They are both plugged in all day every day and surely that adds up to a lot of energy consumption over the year. Also, I find the damned things break down after about a year and need to be replaced (nothing like in-built obsolescence) whereas I'm sure I had the same rotary dial phone in my house for my entire childhood. Also, in blackouts, it's dangerous not to have a functioning phone - every house should have a non-electric phone as a matter of public safety. I am going to wire the house with extra plugs so we can move the phone around according to where we want to talk - there are already outlets in the hall and kitchen and I'll get one put in the bedroom. In the meantime, I'll just get an extra-long cable. Regarding the inconvenience of not having an answering machine: I don't have that many friends and the ones I do have my mobile number.
• Take the train to work one day a week. I drive because I need to get to school for pick-up but I can arrange for someone else to collect one day a week and when they grow up they may even thank me for my pathetic effort.
• Use a basin to wash the dishes in. I live in an old house with a single sink in the kitchen and am absolutely guilt-stricken every time I do the dishes because I let the water run instead of fill up the sink. I will STOP THIS IMMEDIATELY. I will not stop rinsing the dishes though because not rinsing dishes is just disgusting.
• Investigate installing a solar hot water system. This is a big expense but we were told recently that our gas hot water system is actually illegally installed and need to either get it moved or replaced. As good a time as any then to investigate changing systems altogether. Bank loan, here we come!
• Even BIGGER - look into the cost of getting a hybrid car. Our cars (yes - we have two) are reasonably efficient Toyotas. You have to get on a waitlist here for a Prius - so let's get on the waitlist and hopefully by the time we get it, we can afford it!
• Urge everyone I know to see An Inconvenient Truth. GO AND SEE IT! Seriously, this issue is bigger than politics, bigger than ideology - if you're a naysayer, entertain the thought that you might be wrong. I sure wish Al Gore was wrong, but sadly, I don't think he is. Let's listen to this Cassandra before it's too late.
• Jump from denial into action, not despair. This needs to be my personal mantra as my nature tends to get stuck in the negative groove. If I can get upset at bad spelling...you get the idea.

This is not The Picky Bitch's usual rant. We will resume normal programming as soon as possible...

• Okay, I couldn't resist - Checking the Spell Check:
  lightbulbs - apart from light bulbs, which is probably more correct or should at least be hypenated, it prompted LETTER BOMBS - dear Jesus - what kind of people are on blogger.com!!!
• waitlist - same deal - probably should be hyphenated but it prompted our SICK FUCK SPELL CHECK to suggest titlist - TITLIST ohhhhh... I just realised...it's ME who is the sick fuck... I was reading it as TIT-LIST but I think it means someone who has a title, as in Heavy-weight Titlist. Now I know what kind of people are on blogger.com and I'm one of them. I'm embarrassed.

I know, I know...YouTube strikes again...

I'm overdoing the whole YouTube thing, I know, but there is so much great stuff on that site. I LOVE it.



Found this today and had to share.

Al Gore is coming to my town soon and I'm getting very excited at the thought of seeing him in person. It makes me wonder what it is about famous people that makes other non-famous people want to, or feel the need to be in their presence. I was trying to analyse my reasoning behind spending a lot of money to eat in the same room (it's a hoity-toity dinner event thing) as the former Vice President of the United States. My husband is going because he adores the man - I will be spending most of the night trying to calm him down and keep him in his chair. I will be working Secret Service detail on my own husband!

But really - and I don't think I'm the only one who has these feelings - what is it about celebrity or fame that is so intoxicating. Is it about making connections? Is it thinking that the celebrity/fame/fortune will somehow rub off - is fame contagious? Whenever I have met famous people - I've met a few - I've been taken aback by that total disconnect - I've looked them in the eye to see no one looking back. The exception was Patrick Stewart, who I accosted outside a Broadway theatre for an autograph. That man stopped, looked me in the eye, sustained eye contact for what seemed a million years and responded to my amazingly in-depth analysis of his turn as Prospero in The Tempest - "You were great" (yes, that's the best I could do - the pressure, people!) by saying warmly, "Thank you." And THAT is why I will remain a loyal Star Trek: Next Generation fan to the day I DIE!

Is that disconnect a survival technique on their part to get them through meeting lots of people who want a piece of whatever it is they have or we think they have? Or maybe I don't even figure on their radar of people they need to impress? Nah - can't be that! After all, I am The Picky Bitch!

Checking the "Spell Check"
YouTube: Yoruba
Hoity: Hoyt, Hort (!)
Toity: (you're gonna love this) - titty, toot, tout, tit and tot (sounds like a children's radio show in the 30's)

How much do I love YouTube?

A lot (note - two words, not one).

A friend forwarded this to me and it filled my heart with so much joy, I became less picky about stuff. So people want to spell their child's name Typfpfannee - is it really my place to poke fun? So kids think it's great to use the shift key randomly and spell lIKe THiS? Kids - they do the darndest things. So waitstaff think that 'bruschetta' is pronounced "brooshetta" - who am I to correct them?*

Watch this clip and I defy you not to be moved.

*Let's not get carried away by good feeling here - I really do feel it is my place to smirk at hideous spellings of (kind of crappy) names, bitch-slap young people across the head for making an abomination of the English language and give an impromptu Italian lesson to cafe staff. That is why I am the Picky Bitch.

What I'm not that picky about...

I am a movie slut. I love the movies and because of my current circumstances I don't get to go that often, so when I do, I am completely in thrall of that huge screen. I am picky about where I sit - I am a 'sit down the front'-type of person - and also, being judgmental (take note: that is how you're supposed to spell it), can dismiss a potential new friendship based entirely on their suggestion of sitting at the back or on the sides - WHO CHOOSES TO SIT ON THE SIDES??? I have had to sit there on occasion and I won't lie - those whole movie-going experiences were ruined for me. If I have to sit anywhere but where I want to (at the back of the first third of the cinema, in the middle of the row or very close to it) - I am a total brat about it. I've sat by myself down front (yes, I remember it was Moulin Rouge) rather than sit at the back with "friends" - "friends" that are as picky about sitting at the back as I am about sitting in the front. Damn them and their sitting-at-the-back ways!
So it's amazing my friends even want to go to the movies with me, right?
But what I'm not that fussy about is the movie itself. Sure, I pick them carefully, but once I'm in the theatre, I just totally fall in love with what I'm seeing. Usually. I am not that blinded that I wouldn't recognise a completely crappy film but being an optimistic picky bitch, I usually try to find some good in it. Actually that probably has more to do with my arrogance in not wanting to admit to making a bad movie choice.
Another thing I have a tendency to do is fall in love with the lead and start imagining our future together. Tonight I went to see Little Miss Sunshine - which was terrific - and I don't just think that because I was imagining being in simultaneous long-term relationships with both Greg Kinnear and Steve Carell. But it might have had something to do with it. [Where would I be stacking all these men? In the backyard, like cordwood? How would I tell my husband that Greg/Steve and I just "fell in love" and were moving in to have babies with me?? And then would Jon Stewart (who is another fantasy mate - even my husband would like to have him around the house) be jealous? Do I dare hope?]
Can you see why I would be a terrible movie critic? (Apart from the fact that I am demented?) I'd be too busy making up all this domestic bliss crap with the leading men (and dare I admit, even with some leading women - hmm- that got your attention, boys - you are pathetic).
So Little Miss Sunshine was wonderful - go see it. Just remember - they're both mine.

'Spell check' check: Kinnear - came up with 'sinner' (yeah, baby!), 'cannery', knower (as in the Biblical sense?) and 'gunnery'. Who would type 'Kinnear' and mean to type 'cannery' - are those letters even anywhere near each other? I THINK NOT!
Carell offers 'crawly', 'curlew', 'Carl', "Carlo' and 'Carla' (you can't fault the Spell Check for being racist or sexist!) and my favourite: 'cereal'. Which is pretty close when you think about it, 'cause I'd like to be in a situation where I'd be eating cereal with Steve Carell. Snaps to the Spell Check!

A funny story...

Not that funny really but it backs up my thinking about layout artists and designers.

I recently had to get a poster printed for an event I'm organising and was in a bit of a hurry to get it done. Essentially, the work was laid out and set and really, all that needed to be done was to re-style it and smooth out the rough edges - I was working in MS Publisher, which is very clunky and the designer works on a Mac G3000 Turbo with an in-built cappuccino maker and a mouse that doubles as a shoulder massager.

So what comes back from the designer for my approval? A poster that is not only extremely different in 'look' (not all bad as they have access to some great graphics) but is only missing the date of the event, the time of the event, the place where the event is being held, one of the guest speakers and none of the contact details.

Hmmm.

So now I understand how designers could possibly ignore the need for correct spelling - they are too busy trying to de-nude the entire work of any useful information and so 'spell-check' probably doesn't have any use for them as there is no text left for them to check. But it looks real pretty...

Ranting Picky Bitch - over and out.

Words I find hard to spell v's words I find hard to type

I must make a confession - until about 2 years ago, maybe 3, I misspelled the word 'embarrassment' - how embarrassing is that!?! I could have sworn on some-person-who-I-do-not-know's grave that there was only one 'r' in that word. 'Embarassment' - that still looks right to me - can't get my head around the fact that I, supercilious-spelling-bitch-face-that-I-am, misspelled it for eons. Well, maybe decades. I always have to check my own spelling of: liaise, conjure ( a word I totally over-used in English Literature essays and to make matters worse, spelled as 'conjer' - oh, the humanity), humorous...oh, I can't think of any others now but I know they're out there.

On the other hand, there are words that I just can't type without making a mistake: my own name, for Pete's sake - I must have to retype my name 9 times out of 10 - I always reverse a couple of the letters. And for the life of me: October - I cannot type that word without having made at least three attempts. And as it is October now, I'm right in the thick of retyping hell.

Roll on November.

Keeping it all in perspective

I do get a little steamed when I see misspellings on menus, notices, posters, TV advertisements - some would say that's an understatement and that I go on a full-blown rant - I would tend to agree with them, actually. Judgmentally, I perceive it as laziness or at least carelessness. I suppose I put a lot on having standards and I get disappointed, more than anything when I see spelling mistakes - is that pathetic?

When I see a misspelling, my thoughts do not turn to the original writer of the piece but with the layout artist or type-setter or sub-editor - do these people not realise there's a reasonably nifty feature - in direct contrast to that piece of crap paper-clip thing - on most word processing packages called SPELL CHECK ? Seriously, when I saw the word 'brief' spelled as 'breif' on a TELEVISION COMMERCIAL, I needed a little lie-down.

It's TV, people! Lots of people watch it.

Lots of little kids studying for spelling tests (do they still even have spelling tests anymore? - that could explain a lot) while watching television (don't tell me you never did homework in front of the box, because I would be calling you a Mr/Ms Pants on Fire), boning up on the whole 'i before e' thing would be totally confused by that stupid ad.

USE THE SPELL CHECK !

Of course, I am going to be totally humiliated if I get caught on this blog misspelling a word.

To keep it in perspective, I realise that there are bigger things in this world to worry about: the environment, world hunger, raising my kids to be decent human beings (and good spellers!). It won't all fall down on a misplaced vowel. But in my own way, I see the beauty of language as a hold-out against a lot of other ugliness.

Thus endeth the lesson.

(Hey - I just used 'spell check' and it identified 'blog' as a misspelled word - oh, the irony! It offers up: bloc, Bloch, blows, bloke, bolos, blouse and blocky as alternatives - Bloc, I can understand, but BLOUSE? BLOCKY?? BOLOS???)

Time for a disclaimer

Before we get too excited here, I want to specify that although I abhor bad spelling, I am a bit of a punctuation slut. I overuse parentheses, em-dashes, am not too sure about the use of semi-colons and will do the whole '...'-thing to death.

I am human, people.

Just so we're clear.

Oh my - I've found my True Love

Barely is this blog 15 minutes old and I've already found others of 'my kind'.

I love you all.

I found this on pshaw.org and like Kat, don't know who to thank for it. But if you see it, come and claim credit and be embraced by another like-minded individual.

Welcome to my world

You know - in this day and age of mobile phones and instant messaging, I like to think that there is someone out there not taken in by 'LOL' and 'hELlo'. Someone who still believes that that the word connoting gratitude is not spelled 'thx', 'thanx' or 'fanx'. Someone who knows that there are only two 'p's in 'cappuccino'.

I like to believe that.

I believe that that person is me.

Welcome to my world. I will split an infinitive but never cave and spell 'tomorrow' - '2morrow' (except right now to prove my point and only then).