Survival Of The Fittest --- Well Kind Of
I had high hopes for yesterday morning. I had cleared all the food crumbs out of my bed the night before, tucked the blankets in securely, a few ciggs and a bottle of juice on my night table and tacked up the black sheet curtains over my bedroom windows so that the sun couldn't sneak in before I was ready to get up at three.
I forgot one thing.
It seemed, as soon as I got home my head snak into my pillow and my eyes rolled back into my head, something shrieked in my ear. And that demon from hell was the phone.
Impossible, I immedately thought, as my brain sourly atempted to flicker on, impossible, no one I know functions well enough at this point in the night to remember a phone number, let alone dial it. Noone would dare violate the sanctity of the Two O'Clock Rule, which used to be the Twelve O'Clock Rule untill 50 percent of my friends decided to become unemployed and we voted to have the rule amended to two o'clock. The Two O'Clock Rule states, more or less in it's entirety, that "it is against Holy Noctunal Law to purposefully and intentionally disrupt and shatter the sleeping patterns of those who condemn and shun daylight, especially when those persons are inebriated, with a phone call or social visit. Doing so may kill those comatose with loud sound vibrations, as will the exertion of speaking." The only exception to this rule that we could think of for making a phone call before this appointed time concerned the efforts of a troubled friend trying to make bail.
There is no one I associate myself with that would execute a phone call so repulsive in its conception, no one I know that yearns to communicate with me while I am hung over and woken suddenly because when I am, I'm nastier than when I'm drunk. There is no enemy, no ex-boyfriend, no creditor, that will dare experience that - especially before I have my first three cups of coffee and go to the bathroom. There is no sane person in this world who would dare go there - no person except my grandmother.
Before I even screamed "WHAT?" into the reciever, I heard her say "For Christ's sake don't tell me you're still sleeping! I've been up for eight hours! Haven't you fed the cat yet? It's no wonder he craps on the floor, you keep him waiting for so long."
"You're killing me Jane."
"Did you find a job yet?"
"I'm almost dead, Jane," I said, wondering if my grandmother had swarmed on my cousin the day before. Then I suddenly remembered that unlike myself, my cousin possessed qualitys of responsiblities, ambition and survival insticts, whereas my survival instinct consisted solely of lighting an entire pack of cigarettes end to end because I only had one match.
"Have you applied anywhere? How are you going to support yourself? Heidi's already has three interviews."
"I'm hoping I can sell some crack to grade-school kids, and then if I have enough money I'll turn a couple of tricks," I mumbled.
"Don't play funny with me, Your grandfather and I arn't going to support you forever. You need to find a roomate, you're lease is running out."
Okay, so I'm living on the dole since I've been up here, collecting my allowance of one-hundred dollars every few weekends from their house, which is when I'd do as much laundry as well as steal food because a hundred bucks does not stretch far. And every weekend, my grandmother would hand over the five twentys all folded together tightly, and proclaim as it touched my fingertips, "And don't spend this at the bar buying drinks for all your friends."
My grandmother is convinced that I'm living as glamorously as somone who had another one of Mick Jagger's babies. "What do you do with all of that money?" she asked me one weekend I was stuffing my grandfather's mint Oreos into my overnight bag.I ran down the list. "Twenty dollars for gas, twenty for cat food and litter, Twenty to some random bill i have to pay, Seventeen for juice, milk, and some staples of food," I answered. "And that leaves me with thirteen dollars to live on." "Well if you didn't spend all of that money on gas to drive to bars and on that damn cat, you might have enough money to buy your own food and do your own laundry," she said.
"And then you'd find me with a hundred dollars clutched in my hand, swinging round and round from the ceiling fan with a noose around my neck," I said earnestly.
"Don't be such a drama queen and besides, you don't have a ceiling fan!" she retorted.
Sometimes I really hate the fact that Jane can be wittier than me...
I forgot one thing.
It seemed, as soon as I got home my head snak into my pillow and my eyes rolled back into my head, something shrieked in my ear. And that demon from hell was the phone.
Impossible, I immedately thought, as my brain sourly atempted to flicker on, impossible, no one I know functions well enough at this point in the night to remember a phone number, let alone dial it. Noone would dare violate the sanctity of the Two O'Clock Rule, which used to be the Twelve O'Clock Rule untill 50 percent of my friends decided to become unemployed and we voted to have the rule amended to two o'clock. The Two O'Clock Rule states, more or less in it's entirety, that "it is against Holy Noctunal Law to purposefully and intentionally disrupt and shatter the sleeping patterns of those who condemn and shun daylight, especially when those persons are inebriated, with a phone call or social visit. Doing so may kill those comatose with loud sound vibrations, as will the exertion of speaking." The only exception to this rule that we could think of for making a phone call before this appointed time concerned the efforts of a troubled friend trying to make bail.
There is no one I associate myself with that would execute a phone call so repulsive in its conception, no one I know that yearns to communicate with me while I am hung over and woken suddenly because when I am, I'm nastier than when I'm drunk. There is no enemy, no ex-boyfriend, no creditor, that will dare experience that - especially before I have my first three cups of coffee and go to the bathroom. There is no sane person in this world who would dare go there - no person except my grandmother.
Before I even screamed "WHAT?" into the reciever, I heard her say "For Christ's sake don't tell me you're still sleeping! I've been up for eight hours! Haven't you fed the cat yet? It's no wonder he craps on the floor, you keep him waiting for so long."
"You're killing me Jane."
"Did you find a job yet?"
"I'm almost dead, Jane," I said, wondering if my grandmother had swarmed on my cousin the day before. Then I suddenly remembered that unlike myself, my cousin possessed qualitys of responsiblities, ambition and survival insticts, whereas my survival instinct consisted solely of lighting an entire pack of cigarettes end to end because I only had one match.
"Have you applied anywhere? How are you going to support yourself? Heidi's already has three interviews."
"I'm hoping I can sell some crack to grade-school kids, and then if I have enough money I'll turn a couple of tricks," I mumbled.
"Don't play funny with me, Your grandfather and I arn't going to support you forever. You need to find a roomate, you're lease is running out."
Okay, so I'm living on the dole since I've been up here, collecting my allowance of one-hundred dollars every few weekends from their house, which is when I'd do as much laundry as well as steal food because a hundred bucks does not stretch far. And every weekend, my grandmother would hand over the five twentys all folded together tightly, and proclaim as it touched my fingertips, "And don't spend this at the bar buying drinks for all your friends."
My grandmother is convinced that I'm living as glamorously as somone who had another one of Mick Jagger's babies. "What do you do with all of that money?" she asked me one weekend I was stuffing my grandfather's mint Oreos into my overnight bag.I ran down the list. "Twenty dollars for gas, twenty for cat food and litter, Twenty to some random bill i have to pay, Seventeen for juice, milk, and some staples of food," I answered. "And that leaves me with thirteen dollars to live on." "Well if you didn't spend all of that money on gas to drive to bars and on that damn cat, you might have enough money to buy your own food and do your own laundry," she said.
"And then you'd find me with a hundred dollars clutched in my hand, swinging round and round from the ceiling fan with a noose around my neck," I said earnestly.
"Don't be such a drama queen and besides, you don't have a ceiling fan!" she retorted.
Sometimes I really hate the fact that Jane can be wittier than me...