Flip UPDATE

So my buddy Flip (who, judging by the comments and email, will henceforth be known in this space as "Underwear Flip") has issued a response to my viewing-for-voting offer, and that response is... lawyery.

Now he's all about "terms" and "addendum" and "my understanding is..." He wants a front row seat for the disrobing, and is also demanding that I, quote, "move around a little." I frankly don't know what the line is between "move around a little" and "dancing," which as you may recall I have previously declared as right out. What, then, does he want me to do for thirty seconds, if the standing there isn't good enough for him? Work a crossword puzzle? Fire people in a Trumpian manner? Save money on my car insurance by switching to Geico?

We're bringing in the people who negotiated the Presidential debates to get this thing hammered out before Tuesday. I can confirm that as of this morning, we have agreed that a green light will indicate that the countdown has commenced; a yellow light signals that five seconds are left; and red means that we can all exhale and return to our regularly scheduled, fully clothed discussion of whether or not Yukon Cornelius suffered from bipolar disorder.

operators are standing by at blondechampange@hotmail.com

Booooooooo.....

So I’m dumping the box of Halloween costumes out on the floor, and… there wasn’t much there. I don’t mean there wasn’t a great deal to choose from--we’re talking fourteen year’s worth of costumes here—-but… there wasn’t much there. For a person who very recently passed four Halloweens in northern Indiana, which is not particularly known for its balmy late Octobers, there wasn’t a lot of coverage going on in these costumes. The total square feet of material in the lot of them could have covered maybe a six-pack of Tic Tacs.

The dance hall girl, the adorable ladybug, Tink the French maid whose ancestry is totally German: They were all here. I regarded one gauzy skirt with particular interest… which one was this a piece of? Oh, wait, there’s the matching gold bra. I believe the proper term is “exotic dancer.”

You can get away with this, when you’re nineteen and very, very chemically enhanced. When you’re pushing thirty? Not so much. I don’t care what you’ve been drinking.

I think we can officially file this feminine practice of celebrating the vigil of a major Catholic feast day by tarting it up with the Bureau of Double Standards, Irony Department. You don’t see guys trolling the bars any less covered than normal; if anything, they’re blessedly *more* enclothed, what with the pirate hats and the pimp boas and the occasional cape. But women? Women put on a bodysuit and a headband featuring tiny cat ears and wonder why we aren’t President yet.

It’s the same reason, I suppose, why I haul the sarong and the flower headwreaths out of the back of the closet when Jimmy Buffett comes to town. We are offered an excuse to slut around without *really* slutting around, and God bless Spencer’s Gifts, the Official Enabler of Halloween Whoring Nights, for stocking the fishnet hose.

This year I am dressing up as a double standard, I think.

Flipping Flip

Election Fever is increasingly horrible here in The Swamp. As I am about to report in the very near future, early voting was such a positive experience that I actually went home and spewed. That is correct: I can now officially report that this campaign season has made me sick. By Tuesday night I will be throwing up things I ate last Christmas.

It’s all over but the obsessing and the compulsing and the bribing.

The recipient of this honor was Flip, a prosecutor-slash-college friend who calls me up every now and then, which was flattering until I realized that the only other women he talks to are, chiefly, crack whores.

I was devastated when Flip announced his voting intention in the general election, and even though he lives a state in which my favored candidate is up approximately 4000% over his opponent, I was determined to corral that one single solitary vote, so I enumerated several solid reasons to support the this certain program, and defended that specific budget proposal, and also offered to let Flip see me in my underwear for thirty seconds.

This is a completely legitimate offer. There would be no stripping; there would not be dancing or sampling in general; merely a full half-minute of appreciative gazing in exchange for a simple Presidential endorsement. It is a pure and simple business transaction. I have tried, over the past year, to affect this election through such avenues as prayer, financial contributions, and encouraging voter registration. I am utterly appalled that semi-nudity hasn't occurred to me until now.

This concept may be easily applied to the grassroots level. People coming at you with brochures, you’re gonna run. Women doing literature drops in their panties? The world, at minimum, is going to pull over to the side of the road to investigate the situation.

Flip said he would think about it. I should say so.

I bake when nervous.

And also sew.

I made four dozen cookies last night and eighteen dresses this morning. By election day, the entire state will be safe from hurricanes due to the large tarp I will have embroidered for it.

More Magic!

The pressures of working in any Disney capacity are immense. The employees are called “cast members,” because you are part of the “show” for the “guests”, who in fact the “cast members” really, really “hate” and want to “get rid of” via “kicking their annoying dumpy asses directly in the path of an oncoming monorail.”

Cast members exist solely in underground, labyrinthian chambers far removed from any semblance of fun. This is called “backstage”; any area that a guest might traverse over, under, through, or by is “onstage.” The Contemporary actually had a sign over a mirror in a backstage bathroom that trumpeted “YOU ARE ABOUT TO MAKE MAGICAL MEMORIES!” Because if you don’t, Mickey will fire your ass.

I first discovered this while doing marketing at EPCOT three years ago, when I found large clumps of cast members slumped over crumb-strewn tables in the cast cafeteria. This is not an American phenomenon: actual people from actual foreign nations staff the “countries” at EPCOT, and they were just as droopy as the rest of us. This is what comes of eight hours of being so close to France, if only a simulated version of it.

The next time you are in the process of dumping your entire retirement fund into any Disney park, try finding a door to the cast member areas: You can’t. They blend right in. They’re hermetically sealed. They need to be, because once offstage the cast members dissolve into piles of quiet desperation.