MOAR SNOW while I eviscerate 50 Shades of Suck!
Alas, most of it is all melted away again. But for the few hours we had it, it was nice. Southern Illinois got all the really good stuff. :p
--
Thanks to the excellent
eternus_animus and
tsutsuji, starvation has been averted temporarily for the time being. Here's what $45 will get you:
- $20 gas for the car in order to get to the store (the fuel light was on!)
At Aldi's:
- Gallon of 2% milk, $1.88
- 2 boxes of macaroni and cheese, at .59 apiece
- 2 Snickers candy bars (one for me and one for mom; we cut them in half to make them last longer), .65 apiece
- Can of mandarin oranges (me - also, they make me think of
ladyegreen, who is the resident Orange Expert :) ), .69
- Butter, 1.99
- Whole chicken (for roasting), 3.62
- Package of hot dogs, .99
- Pork chops, 3.46
- 2 breads, .85 apiece
Subtotal: 16.81; add on state taxes of .09 and .16 for a total of $17.06.
At Mallwart:
- 6-lb bag of (really cheap) cat litter, 2.24
- 1/2 gallon (I think; forgot to check the label) bottle of laundry detergent, 1.98
- Travel-size pack of hand wipes (me - I tote them around everywhere I go), .97
- 3 cans of cat food (for Sam, since he's the only one who will eat it), .46 apiece
- 4 packages of ramen noodles, .20 apiece
Subtotal: 7.37; state taxes .49, total 7.86.
It's been nice having things to eat besides French toast and eggs. :) Not that those aren't tasty, but eating them 3 meals a day for at least a week (if not longer) can't be good. At least we have a breather for the moment. Many eternal thanks to my dear friends who made this possible. *HUGS*
--
Being more or less stuck in the house all the time, the boredom grows. Mom is getting better; she can now walk without the crutches, although she is still careful with stairs. She has another doctor's appointment this week wherein she hopes they'll clear her to go back to work, or at least give her some sort of paperwork that will reassure the Pit of Despair so they don't kick her out entirely.
I've been trying to write fic - Akabane and Himiko have been snogging it up a LOT lately - but not really getting anywhere since it's hard to write with the folks around. Also, since I've been so stressed and depressed, that eats on my mood too. In the few times where I have enough energy to do something other than play chess or my Pharaoh game on the computer (and speaking of which, how ironic it is that I have such a hard time with the "Prosperity" portion of that game!! Art imitating life and all that), or sleep, I do oddball things. Like soiling my hands with a copy of one of the 50 Shades of Suck Gray trilogy.
I spotted the first installation in this compilation of murdered tree pulp at the library one day about a month or so ago, on their 'clearance' shelf (books and other materials they sell for extra funds). Because paperbacks are so cheap (.25 a PB), and because I have a thing for the occasional morbid curiosity, I said, what the hell. At the very least I will be sparing some poor innocent soul the agony of having to flip through these pages. And oh yes, it IS agony reading this thing, and I'm not just saying that because I have an automatic bias against it based on what I've heard. I've actually been keeping a running count of all the things that piss me off about this book; so far, I've left off at about page 122 because I just couldn't take any more of the bullshit. So that I don't have to suffer alone, here's what we've racked up thus far: (Spoiler alert.) Don't read if you're an *gasp* actual fan, heh. Mine is a merciless vengeance.
- Literally, the very first freakin' page we have here a dad hitting a mom, which sets up the stage for the book's Resident Turdboy, the infamous Christian Grey, getting turned on by abuse. UGH. You know, most writers of horror ease you into the 31 flavors of wrong. This one just dunks you headfirst into it before you've even had a chance to take a breath.
- Okay, this bitch (Anastasia Rose Steele; tying with a certain Swan for the crown of Worst Mary Sue Name Ever here, I see) has a BEETLE!? For that insult alone she needs to die. Horribly. SHE IS UNWORTHY TO DRIVE SUCH AN AWESOME CAR.
- Cue the onslaught of whiny angst, pages 5 through 7. At one interval she bemoans, "I am such an idiot!" Yes. Yes, you are, dear.
- Page 8 offers the lone fleeting glimpse of common sense wherein Ms. Steele says "I cannot be with someone who takes pleasure in inflicting pain on me." Enjoy it while it lasts, kids, because that all goes right out the window in the next second, and by page 11 we're right back into the whiny angsty bullshit again over Turdboy's (aka Christian) giving her a ride to a friend's art show. It's like quicksand, only even when you don't struggle against it, the suck just sucks you under anyway.
- Same page 11, Ana commits a(nother) sin which should by all rights render her fodder for the nearest woodchipper: she swipes her roommate's clothes. Lady, you should know by now that a roomie's stuff is HANDS OFF. End of story. Of course this nitwit remains oblivious to the fundamental facts of life, because she's too busy attempting to wax poetic over the Edward Cullen-wannabe Turdboy.
- We come to what is arguably one of the most annoying parts of the book: Ana has this thing over her 'Inner Goddess.' So much so that she feels compelled to remind us of its existence like every fucking second paragraph. Y'know, just in case we forgot if we were too busy trying to forget all the times she points out how OMG HAWT AMAZING TEH SEX Turdboy is. She thinks so, anyway - personally I'd like to set this Gary Stu in a room with Shido and let the Beastmaster teach this jerk a thing or two about REAL 'animal magnetism'! (Akabane muse wouldn't touch him; said something about not wanting to get his gloves dirtied up with the mess of stupidity.)
Anyhoo, at last count when I'd left off because I just couldn't take it anymore, Ana's Inner Goddess mentions were up to 13. Keep in mind the book is almost 400 pages long. I've barely gotten through a hundred. My inner goddess only knows how many more angst-soaked mentions lie ahead, and my inner goddess really, really, REALLY wants to FUCKING STRANGLE this twit AND her IG. Because unlike Ana's fluffy sparklefart angster, MY inner goddess is a BADASS BEEYOTCH. (See also: Sekhmet, Bast, Ast, Erzulie Dantor, i.e., *real* goddesses)
- Ahh, shades of Shawshank there when Ana actually gets up the guts to call Christian - excuse me, Turdboy - "obtuse." I revel in this slight.
- Cue the world's smallest Angst Violin for CG's "Red Room of Pain." Really? Seriously? I'm in a world of pain just reading that.
- Okay, so this creep hates the thought of anybody but him seeing Ana's picture, so he buys (and in the process, spending a fortune - I swear, I hate this guy just for his money alone) all the pictures her friend took of her just so nobody else can look at them. In the real world, this is called STALKING and it carries - or should, anyway - a heavy penalty, up to and including jail time. Ladies, if you ever meet a man like this, I don't care how OMG HAWT AMAZING TEH SEX or rich he is, RUN AWAY.
- Ana sets a lovely example (not) by turning into a spineless dishrag and agreeing to ditch her friend's show, all because Turdboy is now sulking like a pouty brat who got Legos for Christmas instead of another million bucks. And people wonder why feminists/sane people hate these books so much. Besides, Legos rule.
- For once Inner Goddess's obnoxiousness is tolerable, only because she too has a rare glimpse of Common Sense when she points out to her airheaded owner that she brought this on herself by being so ridiculously dumb.
- Oh god. This next line made me, the baby Jesus, AND Akabane-muse cry: "A knife twisting in my dark soul." Okay, so those tears were from revolted laughter, but still. It's like the bastard child of every horrible angstmuffin ff.net fic ever spawned. (Mind you, the author has more or less admitted that she started out writing bad Twilight fic, which should warn you off right there!)
- Aww, how sweet. CG gives Ana an iPad. Then he buys the company she works at. Psycho wackadoodle much? (A million bucks says CG's the kind of guy who thought that this Valentine's Day card was funny and romantic.)
- It's not enough that Ana most likely has looks that we common peasants would probably envy. No, her life is incomplete and woefully lacking because she's bitter about - not ever having been a cheerleader. And with that, whatever microscopic shred of sympathy for her that I might have managed to dredge up from the depths of my cold, uncaring evil heart has promptly been squashed flatter than the spiders my friend Ayinsan kills in her basement. Who wants to bet that Ana and Bella Swan were roomies at some point? "O NOES I DIDN'T GET TO CHEERLEAD WAAAAHHH" "OMG MY LIFE IS SOOOOOO WORSE 'CAUSE LIKE I HAVE EVERYTHING I WANT EXCEPT FOR THIS CREEPY GUY!" I hate you. I hate you. DIAF, twerps.
- CG says something about Ana and her pill. The Pill, if you know what I mean. OH DEAR SWEET HOLY JESUS GOD AND MOTHER, PLEASE KEEP THESE MORONS FROM REPRODUCING.
- Page 69. Author James sure does like to throw F-bombs around a lot. Hey, I like swearing too, but you're not even trying to make it interesting, lady. "Just-fucked hair" is not sexy, it just makes me snicker like the schoolkid you undoubtedly are channeling for this nonsense. This is (one of the reasons) why I hated the movie Pulp Fiction: too many F-bombs, you've got nothing left. Now, you want to see GOOD uses of fuck, please kindly refer to Cee Lo Green's song and/or the Steve Martin movie Planes, Trains and Automobiles, specifically the scene where Martin confronts the indifferent travel agent. THAT'S how you spew F-bombs, honey. (Ban muse, whose own vocabulary is arguably a master's in colorful cussing, is nodding with emphatic approval as I write this.)
- Oh, now I REALLY hate you, Christian Turdboy Grey. Page 74: "Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit." Yeah, I guess a psychotic overly possessive tight-assed dump of stinky Stu would totally miss out on the awesome power of sarcasm, since he's too busy being in love with his own perfectly perfect angst.
- Ana hates energy-saving lightbulbs because they're "too dim." Nevermind that they save you about $50 on the electric bill, which I know from experience when I lived in Florida. As soon as I could afford to I swapped out every bulb in that place for an energy-saving one (which is also what I've done here). Suck on that, you stale Steele. (Besides, the bulbs naturally take a few seconds to light to their full capacity when you switch 'em on. This is normal.)
- Oh, James. The phrase "magical tongue" only conjures images normally associated with clowns (which as anyone knows are tangible proof of the existence of pure evil), not sensual sex. And the ice cream on the CLITORIS?? NO. JUST NO. This is what happens when you have abstinence-only education, kids. Also, food in the vagina = hellooooo yeast infection. I swear, this thing reads like one of those really godawful skin magazine letters they print from what they claim is their readership. There is a reason bad porn is considered bad porn.
- Ana gets a brand-new Audi (which she angsts over and initially rejects) just for being a stupid piss-for-brains doormat. How come nobody ever gives me shit for being a clumsy forgetful weirdo? I see IG's back again. Forget inner goddesses; now there's a serial killer in me who's just dying (ha, ha) to take a whack at this twit!
- And now we come to the part where apparently there is a(nother) psycho (this time CG Turdboy's ex) running around with a possible gun. I hope she takes you both out with it. (Alas, something tells me this is not likely to be the case.) I had to stop at that point, since my Bullshit Detector was pegged out to the max on its limits. Will I have the strength to face the lame once more and report on its findings? Only time will tell. Between this series and Twilight, it's amazing we still have any of the poor rainforest left.
--
Thanks to the excellent
eternus_animus and
tsutsuji, starvation has been averted temporarily for the time being. Here's what $45 will get you:
- $20 gas for the car in order to get to the store (the fuel light was on!)
At Aldi's:
- Gallon of 2% milk, $1.88
- 2 boxes of macaroni and cheese, at .59 apiece
- 2 Snickers candy bars (one for me and one for mom; we cut them in half to make them last longer), .65 apiece
- Can of mandarin oranges (me - also, they make me think of
ladyegreen, who is the resident Orange Expert :) ), .69
- Butter, 1.99
- Whole chicken (for roasting), 3.62
- Package of hot dogs, .99
- Pork chops, 3.46
- 2 breads, .85 apiece
Subtotal: 16.81; add on state taxes of .09 and .16 for a total of $17.06.
At Mallwart:
- 6-lb bag of (really cheap) cat litter, 2.24
- 1/2 gallon (I think; forgot to check the label) bottle of laundry detergent, 1.98
- Travel-size pack of hand wipes (me - I tote them around everywhere I go), .97
- 3 cans of cat food (for Sam, since he's the only one who will eat it), .46 apiece
- 4 packages of ramen noodles, .20 apiece
Subtotal: 7.37; state taxes .49, total 7.86.
It's been nice having things to eat besides French toast and eggs. :) Not that those aren't tasty, but eating them 3 meals a day for at least a week (if not longer) can't be good. At least we have a breather for the moment. Many eternal thanks to my dear friends who made this possible. *HUGS*
--
Being more or less stuck in the house all the time, the boredom grows. Mom is getting better; she can now walk without the crutches, although she is still careful with stairs. She has another doctor's appointment this week wherein she hopes they'll clear her to go back to work, or at least give her some sort of paperwork that will reassure the Pit of Despair so they don't kick her out entirely.
I've been trying to write fic - Akabane and Himiko have been snogging it up a LOT lately - but not really getting anywhere since it's hard to write with the folks around. Also, since I've been so stressed and depressed, that eats on my mood too. In the few times where I have enough energy to do something other than play chess or my Pharaoh game on the computer (and speaking of which, how ironic it is that I have such a hard time with the "Prosperity" portion of that game!! Art imitating life and all that), or sleep, I do oddball things. Like soiling my hands with a copy of one of the 50 Shades of Suck Gray trilogy.
I spotted the first installation in this compilation of murdered tree pulp at the library one day about a month or so ago, on their 'clearance' shelf (books and other materials they sell for extra funds). Because paperbacks are so cheap (.25 a PB), and because I have a thing for the occasional morbid curiosity, I said, what the hell. At the very least I will be sparing some poor innocent soul the agony of having to flip through these pages. And oh yes, it IS agony reading this thing, and I'm not just saying that because I have an automatic bias against it based on what I've heard. I've actually been keeping a running count of all the things that piss me off about this book; so far, I've left off at about page 122 because I just couldn't take any more of the bullshit. So that I don't have to suffer alone, here's what we've racked up thus far: (Spoiler alert.) Don't read if you're an *gasp* actual fan, heh. Mine is a merciless vengeance.
- Literally, the very first freakin' page we have here a dad hitting a mom, which sets up the stage for the book's Resident Turdboy, the infamous Christian Grey, getting turned on by abuse. UGH. You know, most writers of horror ease you into the 31 flavors of wrong. This one just dunks you headfirst into it before you've even had a chance to take a breath.
- Okay, this bitch (Anastasia Rose Steele; tying with a certain Swan for the crown of Worst Mary Sue Name Ever here, I see) has a BEETLE!? For that insult alone she needs to die. Horribly. SHE IS UNWORTHY TO DRIVE SUCH AN AWESOME CAR.
- Cue the onslaught of whiny angst, pages 5 through 7. At one interval she bemoans, "I am such an idiot!" Yes. Yes, you are, dear.
- Page 8 offers the lone fleeting glimpse of common sense wherein Ms. Steele says "I cannot be with someone who takes pleasure in inflicting pain on me." Enjoy it while it lasts, kids, because that all goes right out the window in the next second, and by page 11 we're right back into the whiny angsty bullshit again over Turdboy's (aka Christian) giving her a ride to a friend's art show. It's like quicksand, only even when you don't struggle against it, the suck just sucks you under anyway.
- Same page 11, Ana commits a(nother) sin which should by all rights render her fodder for the nearest woodchipper: she swipes her roommate's clothes. Lady, you should know by now that a roomie's stuff is HANDS OFF. End of story. Of course this nitwit remains oblivious to the fundamental facts of life, because she's too busy attempting to wax poetic over the Edward Cullen-wannabe Turdboy.
- We come to what is arguably one of the most annoying parts of the book: Ana has this thing over her 'Inner Goddess.' So much so that she feels compelled to remind us of its existence like every fucking second paragraph. Y'know, just in case we forgot if we were too busy trying to forget all the times she points out how OMG HAWT AMAZING TEH SEX Turdboy is. She thinks so, anyway - personally I'd like to set this Gary Stu in a room with Shido and let the Beastmaster teach this jerk a thing or two about REAL 'animal magnetism'! (Akabane muse wouldn't touch him; said something about not wanting to get his gloves dirtied up with the mess of stupidity.)
Anyhoo, at last count when I'd left off because I just couldn't take it anymore, Ana's Inner Goddess mentions were up to 13. Keep in mind the book is almost 400 pages long. I've barely gotten through a hundred. My inner goddess only knows how many more angst-soaked mentions lie ahead, and my inner goddess really, really, REALLY wants to FUCKING STRANGLE this twit AND her IG. Because unlike Ana's fluffy sparklefart angster, MY inner goddess is a BADASS BEEYOTCH. (See also: Sekhmet, Bast, Ast, Erzulie Dantor, i.e., *real* goddesses)
- Ahh, shades of Shawshank there when Ana actually gets up the guts to call Christian - excuse me, Turdboy - "obtuse." I revel in this slight.
- Cue the world's smallest Angst Violin for CG's "Red Room of Pain." Really? Seriously? I'm in a world of pain just reading that.
- Okay, so this creep hates the thought of anybody but him seeing Ana's picture, so he buys (and in the process, spending a fortune - I swear, I hate this guy just for his money alone) all the pictures her friend took of her just so nobody else can look at them. In the real world, this is called STALKING and it carries - or should, anyway - a heavy penalty, up to and including jail time. Ladies, if you ever meet a man like this, I don't care how OMG HAWT AMAZING TEH SEX or rich he is, RUN AWAY.
- Ana sets a lovely example (not) by turning into a spineless dishrag and agreeing to ditch her friend's show, all because Turdboy is now sulking like a pouty brat who got Legos for Christmas instead of another million bucks. And people wonder why feminists/sane people hate these books so much. Besides, Legos rule.
- For once Inner Goddess's obnoxiousness is tolerable, only because she too has a rare glimpse of Common Sense when she points out to her airheaded owner that she brought this on herself by being so ridiculously dumb.
- Oh god. This next line made me, the baby Jesus, AND Akabane-muse cry: "A knife twisting in my dark soul." Okay, so those tears were from revolted laughter, but still. It's like the bastard child of every horrible angstmuffin ff.net fic ever spawned. (Mind you, the author has more or less admitted that she started out writing bad Twilight fic, which should warn you off right there!)
- Aww, how sweet. CG gives Ana an iPad. Then he buys the company she works at. Psycho wackadoodle much? (A million bucks says CG's the kind of guy who thought that this Valentine's Day card was funny and romantic.)
- It's not enough that Ana most likely has looks that we common peasants would probably envy. No, her life is incomplete and woefully lacking because she's bitter about - not ever having been a cheerleader. And with that, whatever microscopic shred of sympathy for her that I might have managed to dredge up from the depths of my cold, uncaring evil heart has promptly been squashed flatter than the spiders my friend Ayinsan kills in her basement. Who wants to bet that Ana and Bella Swan were roomies at some point? "O NOES I DIDN'T GET TO CHEERLEAD WAAAAHHH" "OMG MY LIFE IS SOOOOOO WORSE 'CAUSE LIKE I HAVE EVERYTHING I WANT EXCEPT FOR THIS CREEPY GUY!" I hate you. I hate you. DIAF, twerps.
- CG says something about Ana and her pill. The Pill, if you know what I mean. OH DEAR SWEET HOLY JESUS GOD AND MOTHER, PLEASE KEEP THESE MORONS FROM REPRODUCING.
- Page 69. Author James sure does like to throw F-bombs around a lot. Hey, I like swearing too, but you're not even trying to make it interesting, lady. "Just-fucked hair" is not sexy, it just makes me snicker like the schoolkid you undoubtedly are channeling for this nonsense. This is (one of the reasons) why I hated the movie Pulp Fiction: too many F-bombs, you've got nothing left. Now, you want to see GOOD uses of fuck, please kindly refer to Cee Lo Green's song and/or the Steve Martin movie Planes, Trains and Automobiles, specifically the scene where Martin confronts the indifferent travel agent. THAT'S how you spew F-bombs, honey. (Ban muse, whose own vocabulary is arguably a master's in colorful cussing, is nodding with emphatic approval as I write this.)
- Oh, now I REALLY hate you, Christian Turdboy Grey. Page 74: "Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit." Yeah, I guess a psychotic overly possessive tight-assed dump of stinky Stu would totally miss out on the awesome power of sarcasm, since he's too busy being in love with his own perfectly perfect angst.
- Ana hates energy-saving lightbulbs because they're "too dim." Nevermind that they save you about $50 on the electric bill, which I know from experience when I lived in Florida. As soon as I could afford to I swapped out every bulb in that place for an energy-saving one (which is also what I've done here). Suck on that, you stale Steele. (Besides, the bulbs naturally take a few seconds to light to their full capacity when you switch 'em on. This is normal.)
- Oh, James. The phrase "magical tongue" only conjures images normally associated with clowns (which as anyone knows are tangible proof of the existence of pure evil), not sensual sex. And the ice cream on the CLITORIS?? NO. JUST NO. This is what happens when you have abstinence-only education, kids. Also, food in the vagina = hellooooo yeast infection. I swear, this thing reads like one of those really godawful skin magazine letters they print from what they claim is their readership. There is a reason bad porn is considered bad porn.
- Ana gets a brand-new Audi (which she angsts over and initially rejects) just for being a stupid piss-for-brains doormat. How come nobody ever gives me shit for being a clumsy forgetful weirdo? I see IG's back again. Forget inner goddesses; now there's a serial killer in me who's just dying (ha, ha) to take a whack at this twit!
- And now we come to the part where apparently there is a(nother) psycho (this time CG Turdboy's ex) running around with a possible gun. I hope she takes you both out with it. (Alas, something tells me this is not likely to be the case.) I had to stop at that point, since my Bullshit Detector was pegged out to the max on its limits. Will I have the strength to face the lame once more and report on its findings? Only time will tell. Between this series and Twilight, it's amazing we still have any of the poor rainforest left.