grievance: people's distaste/scaredness of google maps "latitude"

This new technology by Google is absolutely amazing. And the fact that everyone is freaked out by it is both silly and annoying. And is ruining its potential. For those of you who don't know...

Google Maps has created an add-on called Latitude which essentially allows you to connect to friends on Google Maps and see where they are at any given moment.

If ONE more person says "That's so Big Brother" to me, I will punch him or her in the eye.

It's not at ALL Big Brother-esque. You have to individually request each person. It's not as if you enter into this contract with the devil and then every single person you've ever met can track you down at every single moment. As you can see, I only have a handful of friends who are technologically savvy enough to be on it as well. And some of them, like my roommate (who is currently at work, I can see), were completely unlikely candidates to embrace such technology. But she has. And it's been incredibly fun! "Hey... I see you're about a block away. Are you at D'Agostino's? Can you pleeeeease pick up some butter?" And I was. And I did. And she made a scrumptious dinner.

Now to calm some nerves and address some concerns, I will outline some of the magnificent aspects of this amazing program so that hopefully everyone will CHILL THE HELL OUT and embrace it.

1. (As stated above...) You have to individually request each person. If you want one person to be able to see you and are scared of some other person seeing your whereabouts, you don't have to be "friends" with them.
2. You can turn it off and sign out whenever you'd like and will no longer appear on anyone's map.
3. (And best of all...) You can LIE. You can set your location to a fixed place and say you're in Chicago if you so choose. Although I'm not a fan of Chicago and wouldn't do that.

I saw today that my friend was in Atlanta. And after asking him if he was LYING and was really in New York, thought it was so cool that I knew that he was on a business trip to Atlanta. And we discussed the weather and the like (all via BBM: another wonderful technology) and truth be told, as much as I love this person, I probably would never have had that conversation at all. And it's all due to Google Latitude. ...Bringing Us All a Little Closer Together.

So cut the shit. No one is going to stalk you. If you're going to write about your every damned move on (note: these are all links to MY pages 'cause I'm a technology junkie and self-aggrandizing fool) Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Tumblr, your blog, your AOL Instant Messenger away message, your Google Chat status message, your LinkedIn, your BBM status (mypin: 31be47d2) and for fuck's sake, maybe even your now-defunct Friendster account (I don't even have one of those anymore)... chill the hell out with the "That's so Big Brother" bullshit.

-moon

grievance: facebook statuses' grammar

I am shocked to my very core that Facebook actually took down the "is" as part of its status template and now leaves it there for optional use.

By what I am even more shocked is that despite this, people continually use it... and use it WRONG. And what I mean by this is the statuses' predication upon a particular kind of sentence format, namely a person speaking about him or herself in the third person.

Now I'm not knocking people who outwardly go against this sentence structure by either eliminating the "is" after their names or writing something after the "is" which is clearly supposed to go against the structure, like a song lyric or simply a noun, e.g. "Jenn DOUGHNUTS!" or "Jenn is Barack Obama is the shit." I am okay with this kind of erratic grammar solely because it is purposely crafted to be so.

My problem is with people who are too dumb to realize that when they start a sentence about themselves in the third person, they must continue to do so throughout the sentence. The following hypothetical statuses do NOT make sense:

"Jenn is so tired I think I'm going to take a bubble bath and go to bed."
Should be: "Jenn is so tired she thinks she's going to take a bubble bath and go to bed."
"Jenn is studying for a PoliSci exam. OMG I'm soooo gonna fail."
Should be: "Jenn is studying for a PoliSci exam and is sooo gonna fail."

I'm assuming that this makes sense and needs not more examples. All I'm saying is that it's ABOVE infuriating to see this kind of crap on my status update page because it is a blatant offense on the structure of modern English. I understand that my rules for speaking are far more stringent than those for others... but casualisms and slangitudes are really what deteriorate language... and our language already sounds like untrained colloquial drivel.

I'm all about technology, but before Facebook... at least people could maintain the same pronoun and subsequent verb form. At least 'til the next SENTENCE began! Pish posh.

-moon

grievance: bar etiquette (2)

As my bartending days seem to be coming to a very (welcomed) end, I thought it best to address this very small grievance. It is, of course, for the greater good of humanity to understand that this behavior about which I am about to rage is NOT acceptable.

A patron walks into the bar and asks the bartender "what kind of beers do you have on draught?" Already pretty damned annoying seeing as the draught beers are inherently on display. They are IN FRONT of you, patron. But fine. So the bartender either points (if he or she is in a bad mood) or spells it out and lists every single one there is.

"Sam Adams... Stella... Blue Moon... Guinness... Brooklyn Lager... Amstel...."

Herein lies the idiocy:

"Do you have Newcastle?"

And then the bartender goes into a J.D.-from-Scrubs-like-daydream in which he or she jumps across the bar and strangles the person to death.

If you asked me what was on draught and I told you, why would you ask me if I have something else? WHY? Do you think that I'm telepathic and I know exactly which beer it is that you would like and am trying to torture you by hiding the fact that I have exactly what you want?

I seriously think these people should be knocked over the head with a pint glass.

-moon

grievance: baby taxi accidents

Getting into baby taxi accidents is quite possibly one of the most awkward things ever.

"What are 'baby taxi accidents'?" one might ask... oneself.

"Are they accidents involving a taxi cab hitting a baby carriage?" one might continue to sub-question... oneself.

"... Maybe it involves two very small taxis (thus "babies" in the taxi cab "community") hitting one another."

Or maybe none of such self-interrogation will occur because this matter is of no interest to anyone else but me.

So, I shall tell you. "Baby taxi accidents" are accidents when you are in a taxi, as a passenger, and a small accident occurs in which absolutely no one is hurt and there is very minimal damage to anyone's vehicles. The reason I choose "baby" to modify the magnitude of the accident is solely because if I say "woah! I just got into a small accident!" people immediately think I am injured.

All right, now that I've made it exactly clear (with absolutely NO digressions into silliness) to what I'm referring, I think it best to explain why this deserves to be addressed.

When you are in the back seat of a cab and there is contact between that cab and another vehicle, immediately the cab driver goes inSANE and jumps out of the car and you are rendered incapable of making a decision. Do you stay in the cab with the meter running? Do you get out and get another cab? And if so, do you pay for the metered fare thus far? Do you get out and try to help?

It is entirely the most awkward situation in which a human can be. If you're in your car or a friend's car, it's pretty clear that you're not getting out and leaving your friend stranded. But with cabs, you do NOT know this human being.

The other night, I got into a cab and was exhausted from work and just really needed to be at home. And my cab driver was successful in permeating through my callous and cranky disposition with conversational pleasantries. So when a car hit him, I was paralyzed by indecision. Thank the Gods of the Taxi and Limousine Commission that he had the decency to ask me politely if it would be okay if he dealt with the situation and I took another cab and then wished me a Happy Holidays.

Can someone please let me know what the protocol is for how to deal with this awkwardness when the cab driver simply walks away and screams at the other driver? Man!

Geez, I really have a TON of beef with cabs ("grievance: taxitv")! Maybe I should use public transportation more frequently. Oh wait, I have a ton of beef with the MTA too ("grievance: the mta")!

(Sigh.)

-moon

grievance: gravity (part 2)

This is actually remarkable. Not THREE days after I fell down the stairs (and only ONE day after I wrote about it in "grievance: gravity") did my stupid ass fall AGAIN. And just to prove that my outline of reasons for falling was, in fact valid, I took the time to, after I'd picked my sorry ass up off the ground, take a picture.

Exhibit A: Converse sneakers.

Exhibit B: ICE! Look at the friggin' sidewalk. Okay. If I'd fallen on the icy snow on the right edge of the photo, fine. But the sidewalk just looks WET. How is this fair?! I thought we had salt for this purpose.

This one was bad too. I managed to somehow knee myself in the chest/stomach so I knocked the wind out of myself with my OWN body. And was light-headed for about an hour afterwards. But I was also so irate due to this being the second time in ONE solid week that I'd fallen that I started yelling and cursing as I got myself up "MOTHERFUCKER, COCKSUCKER! YOU'VE GOT TO BE FUCKING KIDDING ME!!!!!!"

And yes. Of course. I was alone.

I need to start wearing a bubble.

-injured, angry, klutzy moon

grievance: asking for "no" or "little" ice

As you may know from one of my earlier blogs ("grievance: bar etiquette [silly cocktails]"), I spend some of my weekend nights slingin' drinks behind a bar. And I've already reprimanded some people for ordering particular (embarrassing) drinks. However, I think an entirely different aspect of cocktail-ordering needs to be addressed...

I swear to GOD if you ask me for "no" or "very little" ice, I will take the 1-inch long baby knife on my wine key intended for cutting foil off of the tops of wine bottles and slit your piece-of-shit throat.

Maybe you don't understand. Bartenders pour as they pour. End of story. And I actually happen to have a pretty heavy hand because... Well, let's call a spade a spade, I'm an alcoholic myself. But asking for this limiting of ice makes me so irate that I actually will end up giving you less liquor than I would, were I not assaulted by such a blasphemous insult.

Would you like to know why this SO pisses off bartenders and why you ought not ask for this? Because it says, very implicitly, "I'm CHEAP. I want as much alcohol as I can possible acquire based on the size of that glass." How does that translate into bartender-ese? "I will not be tipping you." Hence, you will not be obtaining any extra liquor at ALL. Not to mention, it's kind of an insult to a bartender's capacity to do his/her job. It's not your place. And you're going to end up with less that way.

I almost become UNCOMFORTABLE when people do that because I'm embarrassed for such fucking parsimony.

New rule (to the tune of Bill Maher's awesomeness): accept what a bartender has to pour. You'll get fucked over and embarrassed if you request otherwise.

New rule: Not tipping? Not acceptable. Oh wait. That's kind of an old rule. Ugh.

-moon

grievance: gravity

I'm pretty cool with gravity generally speaking, you know with its magical capacity to hold things down to the earth and not go flying through the air. And I'm pretty thankful for that. Especially because that means that I don't randomly go flying through the air.

Except that I apparently do.

Falling fucking BLOWS. And the only thing that could possibly make falling any worse is falling ALONE.

I have to admit that this really isn't much of gravity's fault but really more of my own assisted by one of the following:
1. Walking while typing on my Blackberry;
2. Stilettos (usually coupled with a flight of stairs);
3. Converse sneakers (NB: if you wear the same pair of sneakers since you were 16, you're likely to have no traction);
4. Wearing ill-suited foot attire for ill-fated weather (namely 2-inch platform Rocket Dog flipflops, with toe-socks);
5. Being an idiot;
6. Drinking three quarters of a bottle of Jameson.

I think number six will probably take the cake for likelihood of occurrence. However, the thing that really set me off happened Thursday morning. Running for the 4/5 downtown subway, I tumbled ("tumble" is a cute enough euphemism) down about 6 or 7 stairs, thanks to a pair of 23-inch stilettos. This particular incidence was markedly significant for two reasons: I managed to hurt so many different places that I have a new awareness of bones in my body existing; I was alone.

As if falling doesn't BLOW enough. You fall- OW- you have to pick yourself up- MORE OW- and then you have to look around at random pedestrians who saw this who are "concerned" and play it like you're as cool as Danny Zucco in Grease. I mean... at least if you are with someone, you can laugh it off and people don't rush in to be "concerned" because you have someone to "take care" of you should you so need care to be taken.

I was going to write this blog about a year ago when, wearing stupid Converse (#3) in wet weather (#4), I slipped and "tumbled" down an entire flight of stairs while my roommate watched and giggled. I didn't think it was enough fodder at the time for a rageout. But FUCK, did it hurt.

So with time, so other occurrences have... well... occurred (that's what occurrences do, no?). This spring, I was rushing to get to Penn Station wearing.... you betcha... stiletto boots. I jumped out of a cab at the intersection of 34th Street and 7th Avenue, which is a mangled mess of TWO four-laned streets, with 34th going both east and west. My cabby was stopped in the inside lane of 34th street. I was rushing for a train, so I jumped out, took two RUNNING steps toward the south side of 34th, i.e. into ONCOMING traffic and BOOM. Face-goddamned first. A lotta people rushing to my aid. And man, did it hurt. And no one to giggle with. But hey, I got the train.

About three months ago, I got drunk (#6). Very drunk. And was wandering from one Lower East Side shit hole to another. So, PERFECT time to start lookin' through my BlackBerry (#1) and start messaging people. And I was wearing REAL sneakers! Stepped of a curb. Fell. No explanation. No one with me. No skin on my left elbow. Pretty terrific, I'd say.

All I'm saying is that Isaac Newton can suck it.

And that I am an IDIOT (#5).

-moon

P.S. Please buy me some shoes that don't want to kill me.

grievance: 2008

What the fuck is going on with 2008? Not one fucking person I speak to claims to have had a "kickass" year by any value scale. Everyone's year seems to be plagued with job quitting, firings, hellacious break-ups, family sicknesses and deaths, financial problems, quarter- and mid-life crises and a general, lingering malaise. So, I'd like to know... what the FUCK is going on?

Okay... so we're in a recession. Well.. I'd say depression. Nonetheless, there is no way that that can procure ALL of the horrendous things that have happened. Really, that only explains the economic hardship in which some of us have been soaked.

Why is everyone I know fucking miserable? I mean, methinks I need not explain my own ennui as I have entire BLOG solely for the purpose of bitching things out: it's pretty clear that I'm pretty irritable and irritated. But I, myself, have been touched by essentially all of the tribulations I formerly enumerated.

I can't even have fucking fun anymore. "Hey friend whose face I have not seen in a year! How are you? Let's meet up for cocktails and a night of fun!" Yeah... that never happens. Instead, I end up in my apartment with a bottle of vino "bitching one out" as I so eloquently put it. Gosh! I remember the good ol' days of one of my friends having one problem and inviting them over to do that. But now it's like, ALL of my friends and the conversation's not just topic-dependent. One horrific turmoil segues to another without so much as a blink of an eye.

And oftentimes there's crying. A lot.

I hate to be so morose, but I just think it ought to be addressed at the advent of the end of the year. Even the holidays... I look at my Facebook status updates and it's all like "Magellan is Fuck off turkeys! I hope you die in hell!" "Christopher Columbus is I hate holidays!" "Amerigo Vespucci is I'd rather eat my own arm and swallow a bottle of aspirin and vodka than spend time with my family!" (I insisted on using random explorers' names so I wouldn't incriminate any of my friends to their sheer misery but felt it necessary to include the inanity of the "is" in status updates.)

My only hope is that in reading this blog, some of you saturnine messes will embrace the feeling of a synergy with all the other miserable people in the world. Smile! You are not alone! Here's to 2009 being just as horrific.

-moon

raging out at... passwords

Well, well, well.. welcome back to my own blog, ladies and gentlemen! My deepest apologies for the prolonged absence. My time away from you all had nothing to do with a lack of things to rage about (I can always find something!), but rather with the launching of a new site. So of course, the self-promoter that I am, I urge you to go check out Ladies' Locker Room when you're done absorbing everything over here.

The reason I bring up my other site and how terribly busy and important I am (besides the face that I am shameless) is that it led me to today's topic: Passwords. I understand the importance and need for passwords, I do. But sometimes they make my life just a little more difficult.

It all started simply enough. About 12 years ago, when my family first got America Online (saying I didn't have internet 'til I was a teenager is going to age me badly one day). I used the same password for everything. As the years passed, I began to accumulate more and more sites and programs that required a password. Eventually this led to everyone on the planet knowing the information to access virtually anything of mine. My mom, my brother, my friends, random people I've met once... even now I am sure 9 out of 10 people who have ever met me could tell you how to log onto my Facebook. This is not in my best interest.

So over the last year or two, I have been using a variety of passwords. It still amounts to about 3 different passwords, which equals out to about 7 out of 10 people who know me can log on to everything I have. Still no problem there. Perhaps I should stop giving people my account information.

The problem now becomes my inability to remember what passwords I used where and if I invented a new one for any specific reason. This problem is made exponentially worse by the wonderful browser feature that allows your computer to remember your passwords. Of course, I use this function, regardless of the fact that I will let anyone in the world use my computer... my brand spanking new pink laptop, that comes to me courtesy of one of my favorite people on earth.

This weekend, as I decided that the Internet Explorer that the computer comes pre-programmed with is a low-class piece of shit, I decided to download Firefox. Fantastic. All my passwords are stored in IE. I decide to log on and write a rageout about Betty White (I will treat you all to that later). Turns out I have virtually no idea what my password is. I hadn't typed it in so long thanks to these password memory programs that it took me SEVENTEEN TRIES to log in. SEVENTEEN.

Brutal.

You would think I learned my lesson but as soon as Firefox asked me if I would like them to remember the password, I of course accepted their assistance. Some things never change.

-stars

grievance: my appliances

Dear Shower,

Stop arbitrarily choosing a time to raise your temperature 10 fold. Unfortunately, you oft do it while I am washing my face and it really, really hurts.

I don't know what I did to you to receive this kind of bipolar treatment. I also have to file a complaint regarding your desire to drop the temperature 10 fold as well.

I think you should be punched in the face immediately.

Love,
Scalded Moon

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Dear Refrigerator/Freezer,

I'm at a loss for words. All summer long when I desired chilled drinks and the capability to make frozen cocktails, you refused to make ice and, instead, gave me crunchy water.

Now it is winter time and I have no such desire. And not only do you engender ice for me quite willingly but you also freeze bottles of soda and cartons of juice in my refrigerator.

Furthermore, a couple weeks ago you randomly started to leak and now my white tiled floor looks like crap no matter how often I mop it. What's the effin' deal?

I hope you rot in hell.

Love,
Parched Moon

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Dear Cable Box,

I understand that you are all kinds of high-tech but we've had you replaced once already and you continue to manifest severely pixelated images and act weird when I use your DVR functions.

Why won't you let me watch Intervention, asshole?

Love,
Aggravated Moon

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Dear Stove,

When you making clicking noises to let me know to turn you down, the frequency connects in some way with my stereo in my room and makes a reverberating clicking noise all over my room through 8 speakers.

Stop fucking doing that!!!! It makes me feel weird!

Love,
Aurally-Freaked-Out Moon

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Dear Shower Drain,

I DO understand that two women produce a lot of hair. But I find it surreptitious that I need to use an entire BOTTLE of Drain-O on you once a month.
Why are you doing this to me? It makes my shower so gross and I think the cashiers at Duane Reade think I'm cooking some kind of weird drugs.

Love,
Dead Moon ('Cause She Slipped On Soap Scum Due To Improper Draining)

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Ugh. Why can't life be easier?

-moon

grievance: starbucks

At the risk of sounding like Jerry Seinfeld, what is the deal with Starbucks?!

Every single time I go in there, there is some kind of hassle that makes me irate... And I used to really rely on Starbucks to be consistent and take care of shit. But 'tis not so these days, unfortunately. Shame on you, overpriced coffee chain.

Therein lies my biggest problem. Everything is so gratuitously overpriced that none of my grievances should hold any water because there ought not be anything about which to have such. But lemme tell ya. Starbucks blows.

1. Why do they never have soy milk when I want it?

2. How do you not have sleeves for hot drinks? Every time they are out of sleeves, they "double-cup." So I understand that if you run out an hour before closing, you make do with what you have. But there are some stores that go DAYS without sleeves. What a fucking waste! Shouldn't somebody be looking after inventory?

3. (Somewhat connected to number 3) STOP making baristas with tattoos on their wrists wear SLEEVES.
A. You are wasting sleeves;
B. They don't even properly cover anything as they slide around;
C. It looks fucking ridiculous. How can wearing cardboard around your wrists look more professional than a picture of a star?
i. I paraphrase and repeat: cardboard! Wrists! Professional?! Ah!

4. How are you "out of" venti? How is ANY retailer ever OUT of a size of CUP? I had to order a grande and a tall. And they didn't even charge me venti price. It was like 45 dollars for my morning coffee. Fuck that shit.

5. Stop selling that "food." Pastries are fine. But egg sandwiches? Really? Go to Dunkin Donuts. That shit is gross and arrives in boxes. Bleh.

6. Stop selling gift cards when it's always too busy to actually be able to buy one. I just saw the new Starbucks Gold card which actually rewards you for purchasing (yick! This economy is bad) by giving you 10% off. And I actually want to buy that. But the people at the registers are so flummoxed when you ask for one that I actually would feel guilty doing so.

7. Stop trying to sell me music. And newspapers. Coffee shop. Not mall.

I hate you Starbucks! I wish you didn't have such wonderful coffee cocktails and soul-warming drinks like chai lattes and eggnog lattes. Go back to Seattle.

-moon

raging out at... my own arrogance

Driving to work today, I was a bigger hazard to the road than usual thanks to my uber-strained biceps, bruised left hand and scraped up fingers. And why, might you ask, do I currently have the upper body of a refugee? Simply put, I refuse to concede defeat.

When I was younger, like most people with brothers and sisters, I engaged in what was generally normal sibling rivalry. However in the Stars household, instead of this causing world war level fights, it created something much different. It caused both my brother and I to become completely convinced we were absolutely awesome at everything. And I mean EVERYTHING.

I remember being a kid and the America's Cup being on T.V. After a brief discussion, Brother Stars and I figured we could man a boat just the two of us and victory would be inevitable. Papa Stars tried to explain the concept of teamwork and how we would need a team. We were not having any of that. Why would we need a lesser boat racing talent to bring us down? Keep in mind, neither of us had ever even been on a sailboat. That apparently made no difference. It still doesn't. I remain firmly rooted in the belief that, even now, if there's something I'm not good at, it's because I haven't tried. The instant I have even one attempt, I will become the greatest golfer/comedian/cross-stitcher the world has ever seen.

Which brings me to the reason for today’s debilitating injury. It was brought on by stupidity times 3 – sprinkled with equal parts Arrogance, Ineptitude, and Stars Loves JD. My Googled God was around last week for 4 days of amazingness. It was a week filled with dinners and movies and hand holding and all sorts of wonderful "gheyness" that still has Stars in a good mood. (No simple feat considering how easily enraged I am!) It was a pile of whipped perfection, minus one small argument that has now escalated to epic proportions.

I think I can hit a JD fastball. Even writing this now, after standing in the batters' box against him for hours and not hitting so much as a foul ball, I am still positive I can rope him right over the fence. Major league regulation distance. Despite my not only not being able to hit the ball, but it being an accomplishment when I would even remain in the batters' box, JD has agreed to a rematch. He feels pretty certain that my method of swinging the bat as I run away will pretty much assure I never make contact with the ball.

So I spent waaaaayyy too much time at the batting cages yesterday perfecting my swing. The gentlemen at the cages thought I was insane when I asked to be put in a cage against 90 MPH baseball throws. But I did it. And I only ran away a few (hundred) times. And of course in the process, I managed to greatly injure myself between sore muscles from holding the bat too long, bruises from getting hit by the ball, and a bunch of scrapes from running into the fence as I scampered away from pitch after pitch.

I was with myself against JD and again in the batting cages. I saw the extent of my non-accomplishments and yet I am still convinced I am going to crush pitch after pitch the next time he throws to me. I have no problem with self-assuredness and a great confidence, but perhaps it becomes a problem when it starts getting you hurt. One day I am going to try to race in America’s Cup by myself and end up awash on a deserted island. And I will still think I am the best sailer this world has ever seen.

-stars