Exciting News!

I do indeed have a male reader. HI JOE! This is very exciting for me as I hold Joe in high esteem - he has impeccable taste in all things literary and otherwise. So just for Joe, I am going to henceforth pepper my blog with girlie words like "emotion" and "pantyhose."

OH I guess I should explain how Joe and I are acquainted. First we were classmates in grad school, but we didn't really know each other. We were each friends with super fantastic Maureen, who ended up hooking us up as. . . .wait for it. . . .roommates!** I was in need of a place to live as my gay friend/roommate at the time was moving in with his boyfriend. Don't you hate it when that happens? Joe was in need of a roommate, Jenelle was in need of a room, yadda yadda yadda a match made it real estate heaven. Because I have a bit of wanderlust, I have since moved twice since I lived with Joe. And that was only two years ago. Good times. In my next life I hope I am reincarnated as a turtle so I can just carry my damn living quarters on my back.

But enough of that tangent.

I am sure Joe, and others, are wondering What Is New With Jenelle? The answer: absolutely nothing. I have been blessed with an abundance of days off, but not an abundance of money. So my days are, for the most part, spent reading the paper, polishing my nails, rearranging the furniture in my apartment, reading a Tom Cruise biography. Yeah, I said it. Of all the thousands upon millions of literary works of genius I COULD be reading, I am up to my eyeballs in Scientology and Nicole Kidman's fertility problems.*** I have also taken to walking 5 miles a day, which has done wonders for my mental health as well as my -- look away Joe -- fantastic ass. Despite being a Fat Person I have always had a seriously rocking ass. I attribute it to being so damn high strung - pretty much my entire body is clenched at any given time.

So in other news, I promised Maureen I would share a story, and so I shall. Last week I was waiting for the bus at the Pentagon after a long hard day at work.**** It was a gorgeous afternoon, the sun was shining, the birds were singing. Well, I assume they were. It is actually quite loud at the Pentagon bus depot if you did not know this. Anyway, as I am sitting there enjoying the late summer***** sunshine, I see a little girl playing in the trash can. I am kind of grossed out but hey. . . she ain't my kid. All of a sudden the lady sitting next to me snaps to attention - almost like Rip Van Winkle waking up from a 100-year nap. She rushes over, yanks the girl away from the can, and drags her back to the bench. She pulls a tissue out of her purse and starts furiously wiping the child's hands. I am not convinced that the Kleenex can ward off the millions upon millions of stranger germs that this poor child is covered in from playing with used soda bottles and banana peels, so I reach into my fabulous hot pink purse and produce some Purell. I offer it to the woman and she graciously accepts. She pours half the bottle on the little girl's hands and guess what the child does? Sticks her hands in her mouth. It was lemon scented Purell but still. Ewwww. That's a lot of alcohol for a 3-year-old to ingest.

So I guess my Purell offering was a sign that I was Friendly and Wanted to Chat. The lady starts asking me if I have kids. No. Do I want kids? Yes, someday. How old am I? Stop right there. Anyone who knows me even superficially knows that I am freakishly sensitive about my age. But I tell her anyway. Then she asks me how much money I make. I kind of stuttered and stammered and tried to think of a polite deflection when all of a sudden she goes on a total tear about how expensive kids are, and how if I was smart I wouldn't have any, and she used to have a job but she had to quit and daycare is so expensive and Have I seen how much diapers cost? and you can never buy anything for yourself and your family never gives you gifts everything is for the baby the baby the baby. OMG. OMG OMG OMG. It was like assault with a verbal machine gun. I didn't have to worry about responding to her because she barely took a pause to breathe, much less wait for me to rebutt her claims.

So in the middle of this diatribe, this young man walks up to where we are sitting. He gets down on his knees in front of the little girl and says "hi angel" in this voice that seriously creeped me out. I can't put my finger on it, but this guy gave me a bad feeling in my tummy. He kept asking the woman all these questions like How old is she?, What is her favorite toy?, Does she have a lot of friends? It was a very weird line of questioning for a stranger, and I was dangerously close to telling him he was creeping me out when HOORAY the bus pulls up. I was never so happy to see that big lumbering hunk of metal. So as we are lining up to get on the bus, the little garbage picker child runs up to me, throws her arms around my legs, and won't let go. Her mother is just standing there watching. I have no idea what to do. I am very sensitive to the fact that people generally don't like you touching their kids, and I don't need to be sued for inappropriately touching a strange child. But truth be told, the strange child was kind of inappropriately touching me. While her mother looked on. Finally the bus doors opened and the little girl got excited and jumped on. Leaving my legs on the sidewalk, thankfully. And as for me? I did what any good antisocial would do. I deliberately sat down next to someone - even though the bus was only 1/4 full and there were plenty of empty seats - so that the kid, her odd mother, and the creepy stranger danger guy could not sit next to me. Then I pulled out my book so that my new seatmate got the hint to not even try to talk to me. I am such a lovable piece of humanity sometimes.

**Get your minds out of the gutter people.
***I haven't gotten to the Katie chapters yet. I am a slow reader.
****The time was approximately 2:30 p.m. so draw your own conclusions as to the "long hard day" reference.
*****I know, I know. I am pushing the boundaries of summer. It is so chilly in the evenings I have to wear flannel pajamas, but I will insist it is summer until I hear reindeer on my roof.