is "philanderous" a word? no? it should be
September 15, 2003, 7:13 pm

My day was peppered with weird moments. Here, a sampling:

CNET and I were doing our after-school bit where we laugh about stupid things our kids said during the day and/or our own stupidity, then we argue over who dumped whom at the copying machine (our delectable inside joke), and then we make out. Okay, we don't make out, but I wish.

Today I was breaking down my jitters about tomorrow night's impending dinner with Mike at the Sputnik Cafe (shhhhh...it's a secret...don't tell) and I'm baring my soul about why I'm nervous and jittery, and CNET says,

"Jessi, honestly, tell me. What would possess a grown man to eat bubbling hot cheese right off a pizza AS SOON as he took it out of the oven? I mean, really?!?!"

Then I noticed it. His lower lip had a purple blotch, presumably a blister from the aforementioned scalding cheese.

"I'm leaving," I said, heading for the door.

"I mean, really! I had to listen to my buddies rag on me all weekend saying 'Ate a bad batch, huh?' like I had herpes or something!"

I left, then rubbed my lips together. Horror of horrors, there's a PIMPLE on my lip.

Fiestada called to share the news that Ben and Jen are no more. HA! (P.S. Check out this hot quote: "I'm pretty 'Bennifried' out. I mean, who gives a flying Affleck, that's what I say," said [Christian] Slater prior to the breakup." Double HA!)

Me: "Dude, I have a pimple on my lip, is that herpes?"

Fiestada: *laughter* "Uh no, I think you're safe."

"What if I have herpes?!?! I can't have herpes! That would end my days of indiscriminately hooking up with strangers at parties."

"Mmmhmmm. You'd be, 'I have something to tell you.'"

"Christ. I have herpes."

"You SO don't have herpes."

I mentioned tomorrow night's dinner and said "I am destined to be married to the most philanderous, most unfaithful bastard EVER. Why do I do this to myself?"

"Why do you think that?"

"Because I'm always whoring it up with guys that are otherwise attached. Exhibit a) Voldemort, exhibit b) Pittsburgh guy, exhibit c) Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike and Mike. Geesh."

"Yeah, you need to stop that. Has anyone ever done that to you?"

"Er...uh, no."

"See now, if they had, you'd never do it again."

Ouch. Point taken. Okay, maybe not.

Play practice after school was a labor of love as my kids summed up their feelings on our play in four words,

"Ms. Biensoul," said Snoopy, "this sucks."

Gripes. I really, really like our play, but maybe I was too ambitious in picking it. It's a GOOD play. If they only knew the shit we used to put on...they're just mad because there's talking and it's philosophical and it's dramatic in some places. It's nothing they've ever done before.

It put a damper on my afternoon.

Then I read that poem "Richard Cory" and that made it even worse.

THEN the email came. My buddy from high school, Melissa, works as a meteorologist in Florida. Blah blah blah about the news, she's in the know, and guess what, group? Batten down the hatches, 'cause we's got ourselves a hurricane!

Hurricane Isabel is french kissing the hot jock that is the Atlantic Ocean and is hiking her skirt up the East Coast, poised to fuck the Chesapeake Bay sometime Thursday night. The good news? No school. The bad news? Where the hell is all this rain going to go?

Folks, we're SATURATED here. There is no more room for a drop of water ANYWHERE. Trees will be upended like cheerleaders doing basket tosses; the saplings in my front yard will be picking the front teeth of my neighbor's windows.

If a tree lands on my car, I might have to kill someone.

Let's review.

By the end of this week, I will have:

1. Had a wonderful but painfully awkward dinner with my ex-ex-ex who is leaving for L.A.,

2. Had three practices for a play that my students don't like and that I'm horribly defensive of now,

3. Contracted herpes (or not),

4. Gone to the Orioles game on fiestada's dad's nickel (score),

5. Caught a mouse in my house,

and 6. Had a tree land on my car or on my house or both.

*sigh*