Sisters Are Doing It For Themselves

Recently I’ve been noticing the growing numbers of policewomen on the streets, looking – admirably – much, much tougher than the males. Rumor has it that they don’t take shit from anybody, as well as being totally immune to bribing.

It’s such a sad view witnessing fat-arsed, pot bellied policemen attempting to look authoritative when there are straight backed, mean looking policewomen who seem to display more attitude than their fellow male colleagues.

Lately I’ve been feeling sorry for men due to the fact that they are becoming more and more non-existent than before and I can’t help but wonder if they ever feel threatened with us females for taking over their jobs and what used to be preserved as ‘a man’s job’.

From bus drivers to scavengers, these women are the ones deserving the salutes. No more being perceived as the gender that belongs in the kitchen only, these women are making their own money and they’re damn proud of it. No matter what jobs they hold, you can tell by the look on their faces that they’re satisfied with what they do.

Well, I gotta say – you go girl. You kick ass.

Cable Is Able

Move over the DVD player, I’ve found something better. We’ve finally got cable installed in our neighborhood and we’ve got a free trial for all the channels for a full month.

It is fully sick, mate.

All of a sudden, the idiot box has been transformed into a tube of non-stop roller coaster fun full with movies I haven’t seen, movies I’ve been wanting to see and movies I never thought existed. There are the hip home decoration shows, fashion fixes and makeovers at Style, non-censored documentaries of women getting breast reductions and giving births on the Discovery Home & Health, and not to mention the dirty nitty-gritty details of the celebrities on E! Getting caught on the most embarrassing situations, like showing their cellulite-induced thighs through their super mini skirts. Or something.

Anyway, what’s best is that all of them come with no ads. Beautiful.

I’m totally hooked and I practically have to unglue myself off the remote control to prevent myself from becoming a fat arse couch potato because the whole flicking-the-channel thing is so relaxing, it’s like exercise for my fingers.

HBO is like the savior for my fucked up sleeping pattern because on those nights when I can’t seem to fall asleep, I can always tune in to it and let myself be passively manipulated by Hollywood / American-dreamlike alternate realities or when there are no good movies on, I can always rely on the utterly gross but fascinating documentaries on the Discovery Channels.

Or getting shocked by people as glamorous as Sarah Jessica Parker turning up at the Oscars wearing a puff balled cotton-candy-ish outfit on E!’s 101 Most Sensational Crimes of Fashion.

Or pretend to be intelligent and important by flicking through CNN and CNBC, without knowing what the heck is actually going on, to be perfectly honest.

The Digital Era.

I’m lovin’ it.

Busker Magnet

Whenever I struck up conversations with my fellow working-class friends about catching public transport, we always ended up surprising each others because we seemed to get similar experiences – in a spooky, twisted-world kind of way.

Like today for example. I was on the bus and this female busker got on and out of all the seats on the bus, she picked to stand next to mine, and started singing away.

So I had the exclusivity of having to hear the falsetto voice a lot more clearly, along with the atrociously strummed sound of the guitar reverberating through the bus’ walls and back. I winced and rubbed my privately-invaded ears, hoping to God that the torture would end soon enough. Fortunately, she was facing the other way so I was saved from all the rains of saliva that would land on my freshly-shampooed hair.

After she was gone, another busker – this time a male with long hair and a voice I couldn’t quite decide which category it belonged to (good, bad or just plain weird) – got on. And again, he picked to stand on my side.

Now, I thought. There’s gotta be something really wrong with me, or I’m just a busker magnet.

Is it my face? My hair? Or perhaps the way I dress? Why, why do buskers feel so comfortable to perch themselves next to me?

As I kept wondering, I decided to ask my friends’ opinion on this and they said, “I always get that. Every time I get on the bus. Out of all the seats on the bus, they pick to stand next to mine.”

So I looked at my friends’ faces, hair, clothes – anything that would give me clues to the reasons why we were busker magnets. But so far nothing.

The only, legitimate, positive conclusion that I could conjure up is this: Buskers pick us because we look kind, like we’re the type of people who would give them spare changes.

Either that or we just use really good deodorants.

Are You Strong Enough?

There is certain tiredness in all of us that sometimes manage to make us feel down and helpless. It’s not so much of a physical thing but more like an emotional black hole that makes us feel somewhat empty and lost.

How did life become so difficult to live? I always wonder what keeps everyone going, day by day, doing things that they are doing. The people I see on the bus, getting up at 4:30 am everyday to get to work and slave themselves off for whatever it is that drive them to do so – is it money, career, or family? At the end of the day, when they are stuck in the traffic jam, I wonder what goes on in their minds.

When I was carpooling on my way home from work, sometimes I’d observe the faces of the people who were falling asleep in front of me – and I felt such sympathy and compassion that was strangely familiar. The tired, wary expressions that made them look older than they were supposed to. The knowledge that tomorrow would be yet the same. When will it ever stop?

I don’t want to end up like them – having mundane jobs where they end up feeling exhausted by the time they hit the sack at the end of the day, as if life is spent working their arses off for things that are not quite substantial as they seem.

But time rolls by, and fear clutches me right in, that I might end up worse than them. All the jobs interviews I’d been, all the tests I’d failed, all the work and traveling I’d done, all the relationships I’d come to compromise, all the good things I tried to do and all the bad things I’d seemed to enjoy doing – all of them appear to have come to no point yet no end either.

I am tired and worn out. All the energy seems to be draining out of me; I can’t find the strength to even cry my heart out the way I used to. All there is to it is this emptiness that leaves me awake in the dead of the night.

In times like this, I wish I was back into being a little girl who could cuddle up to my mother’s arms and fall asleep, not worrying about anything at all.

Not having to think about career, jobs, boyfriend, dieting, etc., etc.

Not having to give reasons to be loved, but just simply loved for being me.

What You Drink Is What You Are.

(My sassy friend Maie from down under sent me this enlightening little piece of information via e-mail – go on, have a laugh)

Seven bartenders were asked if they could nail a woman’s personality based on what she drinks. Though interviewed separately, they concurred on almost all counts. The results:

Beer
Personality: Casual, low-maintenance; down to earth.
Your Approach: Challenge her to a game of pool.

Blender Drinks with umbrella
Personality: Flaky, annoying; ditzy, and a pain in the ass.
Your Approach: Avoid her, unless you want to be her cabin boy.

Mixed Drinks – no umbrellas
Personality: Mature, has picky taste; knows what she wants.
Your Approach: If she wants you, she’ll send YOU a drink.

Wine – (bottled, not 4 liter cask)
Personality: Conservative and classy, sophisticated.
Your Approach: Try and weave Paris and clothing into the conversation.

Smirnoff Ice
Personality: Easy; thinks she is trendy and sophisticated, actually
has absolutely no clue.
Your approach: Make her feel smarter than she is…and you’re in.

Shots
Personality: Hanging with frat-boy pals or looking to get drunk …and naked.
Your Approach: Easiest hit in the joint. Nothing to do but wait.

Then, there is the male drink analysis. The deal with guys is, as always, very simple and clear cut.

Cheap Domestic Beer: He’s poor and wants to get laid.

Premium Local Beer: He likes good beer and wants to get laid.

Imported Beer: He likes expensive beer and wants to get laid.

Wine: He’s hoping that the wine thing will give him a sophisticated image to help him get laid.

Whisky: He doesn’t give two shits about anything and will hit anyone who will get in his way of getting laid.

Tequila: Piss off, all you wankers, I’m gonna go shag something with a pulse.

Smirnoff Ice: He’s gay.