Perfume: Not for the Weak

In case you didn’t know, later this month is National Celebration of the Senses Day. As a Taurus, known lovers of sensual pleasures and luxuries, I will be honoring this holiday to the extreme. For those of you that are a little less inclined to overindulging your senses, I offer a guilt-free alternative. Watch Perfume.

What, you’ve never heard of this movie? I’m not surprised. It’s entirely possible the only reason I know about it is that in college we made a habit of looking up Alan Rickman movies (for Alan Rickman movie night, duh). The full name is Perfume: The Story of a Murderer. It is based on a book, but I only brought myself around to reading it some time after first seeing the movie. I didn’t particularly care for the book. I believe my friend Jenn prefers it though, so don’t take my opinion as a reason not to read it.

Perfume is an interesting movie. I shy away from terms like “good” for this one, but there are things about it that I find very compelling. There are also parts that are a total mind screw, just to warn you. I happened upon a post the other day that notes Perfume “both suffers from and subsequently plays with the fact that film is still a medium that cannot engage all of our senses, such as smell,” which I consider both remarkably accurate, and one of the main reasons I (somewhat) enjoy the movie.

The main gist of Perfume is that there is a character, Jean-Baptiste, who has such a heightened sense of smell that he experiences the world in an entirely different manner from the rest of us. He fears losing wonderful smells, and becomes a perfume apprentice in order to learn how to capture scent. His goal evolves to try and create the perfect perfume.

While this is an interesting premise, I can’t say the storyline is the draw for me. That’s probably why I didn’t really care for the book. What I find fascinating is the way the movie tries to get the viewer to experience what Jean-Baptiste experiences. Obviously, we can’t. We can’t smell things through the tv. What they do instead is use visuals and audio to pull us into the same mindset. This is what I so thoroughly enjoy about the movie.

The other interesting aspect of the movie is the ending. While I’m not going to give away any spoilers here, we used to make people watch Perfume just to see how they reacted to the end.

This is a movie that I feel like everyone should watch at least once, and then I’d enjoy discussing it with them, but there’s a good possibility you may dislike it or be morally offended. So since I like lists, here are some reasons to either watch, or not watch it.

Reasons to Watch Perfume

5. Dustin Hoffman wears a wig. What, that’s not a good enough reason for you?? His scenes are plenty great without the wig, but it’s nonetheless a source of delight.

4. The dark humor is amusing if you like that type of thing.

3. The visuals (in my opinion) are stunning.

2. If nothing else, it raises tons of great questions about life, meaning, beauty, sociopaths, and so on and so forth.

1. Alan Rickman portrays potentially the fictional world’s best father (Liam Neeson is probably winning that contest); very appropriate as Father’s Day is also coming up.

Reasons Perfume May Traumatize or Offend You

5. There’s violence.

4. There’s nudity.

3. There’s a casual disregard of humanity.

2. There are religious references and some religious figures involved in unseemly behavior.

1. The ending, pardon my French (that’s a joke by the way, since the movie is based in France. I knew you didn’t know that so I was nice enough to clarify), is a total “what the f*ck” experience.

This will take on a whole new meaning...

If you do watch it, or have watched it before, please find me (that can be virtually, we don’t need to get into a stalking scenario) and tell me your thoughts! I will say this, the movie left such a strong impression on me that I spent several subsequent days with trash cans placed in front of my door. This is actually my friend Jenn’s top reason for why you should watch Perfume, and it will make more sense once you do!

Baking with Wry

There’s a common misconception that I’m a nice person. Even people that have known me for awhile get confused on this matter. Someone at my current job said that I don’t “have an angry bone” in my body, which is super untrue. Another friend at my previous job told a coworker that I am “the nicest person ever.”

PB & banana muffins

I think what confuses everyone is the baking. Possibly also my face, but mainly the baking.

I love to bake. My first attempt was in college, when my brother was coming to visit and I wanted to surprise him with cookies. Then when my friend Erin moved to California, I took up the mantle of office baker. Initially I stuck with cookies & cakes. Since moving to Austin I have experimented with breads, cake balls, and one time I tried making a pie. I then distribute my baked goods to neighbors, friends, and coworkers. This apparently gives people the impression that I am a kind person, and baking for their benefit.

Generally, that’s not the case. Don’t get me wrong, there are instances (like birthdays, or when someone’s sad) where I’m baking for the other person to give them delicious goodies, and thus happiness (remember I’m a Taurus, we equate food with pleasure). The majority of the time though, I just want to bake, so I do. Then I’m stuck with all these stupid cookies/muffins/scones/whatever and don’t want to eat them. Giving people the food allows me the pleasure of baking without having to eat it. So in reality, it’s kind of a selfish thing. Don’t believe me? Let’s look at my top 5 reasons to bake:

Cookies!

5. Bored-baking

4. Baking to eat cookie dough

3. Baking to dance around the kitchen (baking/cleaning justifies it)

2. Happy-baking

1. Stress-baking (depending on the stress level, sometimes rage-baking)

Given that I still can’t jazzercise because of my knee (over 4 weeks and counting, I’m having withdrawal), I have been baking up a storm. Everyone at work is getting spoiled. However, I found myself in the midst of a dilemma.

Bread basket (THAT WAS HARD!!)

I do own a hand mixer. My lovely mother got it for me a Christmas or two ago. Prior to that, I never used any sort of mixer when baking. I normally make do with a fork. When I first brought my mixer home I was a little intimidated by it. So to make it more approachable, I named it Ryan, quickly shortened to Ry. This worked to get me to use it a few times but the thing is, if I’m truly stress-baking, I prefer to use the fork. Especially with making bread… it is so amazingly satisfying to beat that freaking dough into submission.

With my knee hurting though, I wanted to bake, but I also wanted to severely cut down on my standing time. I think I’ve used Ry more in the past 4 weeks than I have the entire last year. And you know what? He’s handy. I like him. I think moving forward I’ll be seeing more of Ry for happy or bored baking, but maybe stick to my trusty fork for the rage-baking.

I can’t honestly say I’m a “good” baker. To be fair, the only things that turned out “bad” were my first few bread attempts. I was estimating at my water temperature at first and apparently I’m a horrible estimator. Once I got a baking thermometer my bread started looking like bread instead of scary dough lumps.

Watermelon cupcakes

My problem might be my perfectionism. I constantly think the final result could be better. Just last week I made some oatmeal chocolate chip cookies that I didn’t like at all, but they were DEVOURED at work. Of course, I don’t even like oatmeal cookies. I can’t remember the last time I had one. Which brings me to my top 5 baking challenges:

5. Making things a consistent size

4. Spreading anything evenly (I rarely if ever use my rolling pin, so that could be a large part of the problem)

3. Judging whether or not fruit is properly ripe and should be used

2. Chopping any type of fruit (although apples are the worst. There’s a good chance I will lose a finger making apple cookies one of these days)

1. Attempting to make things that I don’t even know what the final result should look/taste like

I like to expand my horizons and try new things that people request, but half the time I’ve not only never made it before, I haven’t eaten it in years, if ever, so I’m not entirely sure if it really turns out okay or not.

SO MUCH BAKING

Actually no matter what I’m making, even if I’m made it multiple times before, there comes a point in the baking process where I’m convinced it’s going to end horrible and I’ve messed it up beyond repair. So I shrug, maybe take a sip of wine, and carry on. Worst case scenario, it’s inedible, and I can live with that. That may be one of the other reasons I like baking. I know I’m a perfectionist. I know I stress out constantly over stupid little things. I know very well while baking I will become convinced that I’ve done it all wrong and it will be nasty beyond repair. On the other hand, I know I’m having a great time attempting it, and even if something does turn out bad, it’s not the end of the world.

So does baking make me a nice person? I’m going with no. Totes no. If you really want to think I’m a nice person, that’s fine, but let’s all accept that the baking has nothing to do with it.

P-p-p-poker Face

Last night I was playing poker with some of my boys, which let me tell you I haven’t done in YEARS. We went through a big poker phase in high school, which continued a bit into college, and then I just stopped. Possibly because I am the worst poker player in the history of the world.

Seriously, poker is complicated. I hardly ever remember what beats what (it seems to me like 2 pair should be better than 3 of a kind, because there are 4 cards involved, but they always tell me I’m wrong on that). I have this issue where the 6 and 9 cards look the same and confuse me. Not to mention I continuously forget the denominations for the chips.

Even worse, as they tell me in Jennifer Crusie’s wonderful book Faking It, poker is actually about knowing the other players. You need to know who’s bluffing and who’s actually got something good. The idea is you learn everyone’s “tell” and use that to better play the game. If you’re not a reader, you can see excellent examples of “tells” in movies like Maverick and Casino Royale.

This is a good (and sexy) poker face.

I find this just about impossible. I’m not particularly good at reading people. I’ve discussed before how I’m constantly missing the conversational subtext. You can imagine how well I do reading the subtleties of the poker table.

The amazing thing is that I do sometimes win at poker. Last night I was one of the last 3 playing. Probably would have finished 3^rd, but we just quit the game. How do I explain this? Well, because of my horrendous poker face.

To be clear, ideally you should have a GOOD poker face. Also to be clear, I’m talking strictly about your face at the moment (none of the Lady Gaga muffin-bluffin whatnot is under discussion). A good poker face is like a mask. No one knows what you’re thinking; no one knows when you’re bluffing.

A BAD poker face gives everything away. Every emotion - from when you pick up your cards, to the moment of the flop, to when you’re betting - makes it entirely clear what you’re doing.

I have a BAD poker face. But my saving grace in poker is that half the time I don’t know what I’m doing. I think I’m bluffing, and my face tells everyone thus, but meanwhile I didn’t realize I have a straight in my hand. This has happened multiple times (although not always specifically with a straight).

My hysterical laughing prolly didn't help matters.

Honest and true time, this is something I should probably work on. Not specifically for poker (I don’t play that often, and worst case scenario I could cover up like one of my friends last night... see example to the left) but more so for life. I sometimes worry that I have overly expressive eyes and face. We used to play a game in college where we would cover the bottom half of our face and guess emotions just based on the eyes. When they were looking at my face, my friends had a 100% success rate. My sign (Taurus, for those that don’t pay attention) is known for our “bedroom eyes.” Well that’s fine and dandy except that I have no control over it whatsoever. So at any given point I do not know what my face is telling you.

This is especially dangerous because my thoughts are all over the place. What shows up on my face may have absolutely nothing to do with the conversation. I swear almost once a month I get in a situation where someone’s like “what’s THAT look about!?!?” and I don’t even know what they mean.

Now if you haven’t realized this already I’m about to reveal something super useful for dealing with me. What this all comes down to is I can’t lie worth crap when it matters.

I have to clarify, “when it matters,” because for really stupid stuff I can lie awesomely. I can look you straight in the eye and convince you I grew up in Russia on a beet farm. That’s not even an exaggeration; I totally had a guy from work believing that for like 5 minutes. Then I realized he was taking me seriously and I had to clear it up. I only have this ability when I find what I’m saying so absolutely ridiculous I don’t think anyone will believe me.

So when I seriously need to lie, such as for surprise parties, or when I’m talking about people I’m interested in, it doesn’t actually work. I’d be a horrible spy. I blame this entirely on my stupid face. Because even when I try to control it, the best I can do is a lack of emotion, which apparently looks so completely different from normal that no one believes it anyway.

The right puppy eyes could take over the world!

Maybe this should be a goal for next year, learning to control my expressiveness. There’s a scene in Memoirs for a Geisha where Chiyo learns how to use her eyes to make a delivery boy drop his packages. Granted, she had awesome eyes, but the idea appeals to me nonetheless. If I could learn to use my expressiveness who knows what I could do?

You Won't

-->

You have no idea how ready I am for this upcoming 3 day weekend. I have been traveling like a mad woman this month and I am uber excited to camp out in my apartment, eating, tv watching, and video game playing to my heart’s content. Since my friend Erin and I are basically the same person, she read my mind and revealed the secret to the perfect movie marathon. I was already planning my own little movie marathon for the weekend, but I’ve been wrestling with a little dilemma all week.

My movie marathon plan was to watch the Bourne movies. I’ve never seen them, and after seeing previews for the new Bourne (which has Jeremy Renner in it, and I think he’s my new bf. In case you didn’t know, he plays Doyle in 28 Weeks Later and we all know how much I love Doyle) I was intrigued. Plus they just seem like the type of movie I'd enjoy, so I always meant to watch them at some point.

However, I don’t own the Bourne trilogy. I mean of course I don’t, we know I have a very strict rule against buying movies I've never watched. So I picked them up last weekend from my friend Pietro. EXCEPT Pietro also gave me the movie Cars, and said that was the price of me borrowing them.

Fricken A.

See I have this thing with the movie Cars. I have declared I will never watch it. Pietro knows this and it’s beyond his comprehension. He has been “subtly” trying to get me to watch the movie for a while, and this is just the latest attempt.

Why am I never watching Cars? Well that’s simple. Too many people told me to. For whatever reason I didn’t see it when it first came out. I was busy or something. Basically everyone else in the world saw it, and all of a sudden that’s all they could talk about. My friends, the people I babysat for, random people on the bus. EVERYONE kept saying “oh it’s so great, you should watch it!” The first time I agreed, the second time I made a mental face, and by about the third or fourth time I was dead set against it.

You CANNOT tell me what to do. It ends badly. In fact, back in college my friends used to have a game called “you won’t.” Not only can you not tell me what to do, you can’t tell me what NOT to do. So whenever they started a sentence “you won’t” they knew I’d end up doing whatever they said.

Some people out there might call this a mark of defiance. Some might call it stubbornness. It’s more a mix of both.

For the longest time this was a big joke in my house. My parents were always talking about how “defiant” I was, but I just didn’t see it. It felt so natural, I assumed everyone did the same thing. You know, normal kid stuff like sitting at a table for hours because they refused to eat dinner instead of icecream. Attempting to run away at 5 years old because they weren’t allowed candy before dinner. Not talking for a day because their brother said something to make them mad. All totally normal!

It didn’t really occur to me that perhaps I have more issues with authority than most people until I got into reading Indian captive stories. I love historical fiction, and at some point in my preteens I went through an Indian captive phase. Yet I soon realized that these stories inevitably infuriated me. The problem was that eventually, the main character succumbed. Personally, a lot of times I was on the side of the Native Americans. Their culture seemed way more interesting. BUT, if the character starts their captivity by swearing they’re not giving in to the heathen ways, then they better not change their mind halfway through! I don’t care how much sense it makes, you DO NOT GIVE IN. In fact, screw just being sullen and unpleasant. Try to escape! Go on a hunger strike! Attack your captors! ANYTHING besides meekly submitting.  

At this point I’ve accepted that I might have some defiant tendencies. Luckily they don’t rear their ugly head in professional situations. And I’m well aware that this is the entire reason I won’t watch Cars. So knowing this, can I indulge my bad habits and stick to my guns, or do I need to mature a little and get over it?

I’ve been debating this all week, and as usual, the universe just keeps throwing it back in my face. I get to CA, and there are signs all over the place for the new Cars theme land. Cars 2 commercials keep coming up on tv. Even the radio was talking about Cars.

Thus I now have to turn to my favorite way to resolve a situation… the pro/con list.

Pros to watching Cars

• I might like it.
• I like Pixar movies.
• I won’t feel bad about borrowing the Bourne movies.
• If Pietro asks, I can answer honestly.
• It will be a good step towards dealing with my defiant & stubborn tendencies.         

Cons to watching Cars

• I said I wouldn’t.
• A little piece of my soul might die.
• Before all the madness, I once saw the first 10 minutes and wasn’t impressed, which is a good indication I might not like it.
• Pietro will probably not pursue whether or not I watched it, so I’d be giving in for nothing.
• Technically, he didn’t explicitly say I had to watch it in order to watch the Bourne trilogy, it was really more implied and I can’t be held to an implication.
• I said I wouldn’t. 

The real problem is that Pietro didn't say I HAD to watch Cars. If he did, that'd be a no brainer. He's far too evil and clever for that. He presents situations like I'd be an idiot not to do something, and then shrugs and says he doesn't care what I do. It's infuriating, because I can't get mad about it.

But the con list is so much more stacked right now...

Don't Mess with the Bull, Young Man

This week was the birthday for one of my other good friends from college. I almost missed it, because they don’t have it listed on Facebook. Seriously, that’s like 67% of the reason I use Facebook- to track birthdays.

I can honestly say that there are only 4 birthdays that I have completely memorized. If somebody threatened my life unless I could give them 5 birthdays immediately, I’d be doomed.

One is my brother’s. This is probably in large part due to the fact that my grandparents used to give me presents on his birthday too. Another is my mother’s. The only reason I know this one, is because the day is the same as mine, and I know the month. Don’t even try to get me to tell you the year. I’m sure whatever answer I come up with will mortally offend my mother should she ever hear.

You would think my daddy would be another one, but actually, no. I know it to a few days (again, ignoring the whole year thing). I can normally figure it out, but it takes a few minutes. I second guess myself. Initially I think it’s the 20^th, then the 21^st, then I’m like no it’s the 19^th, because I would remember if it’s the 21^st and it’s not the 20^th, and I keep going through this process until I make a final decision.

The other two birthdays are my friend Cortney’s, and my godson’s. The only reason I remember Cortney’s is because it coincides with one of my bad luck days. My godson’s birthday, I just know. Sadly I DO NOT have the birthdates for my goddaughters memorized… but nobody needs to tell them that. I know the general range of time. Plus my godson was born first. He gets priority (but again, nobody needs to tell my goddaughters).

Really, it is mildly cruel to expect a mildly dyslexic person to remember anything involving a string of numbers. Don’t even get me started on the issues I’ve had with my new cell number (and by new, I mean from last August…) or with switching my address.

It vexes me though because I LOVE celebrating other people’s birthdays. It’s one of my favorite things. I also like celebrating them ON THE ACTUAL BIRTHDAY.

The good news is I have a trick for remembering birthdays. The bad news is it only really helps me get within a week or two.

Love me some Raj

See, I happen to like astrology. Not to be confused with astronomy, the actually scientific field of studying space-things like Raj does in Big Bang Theory. No, I’m talking horoscopes. I love ‘em. I always have at least one horoscope app for daily ones, I have multiple books about the general signs, and at the end of the day that’s one of the things I’m going to remember about you. What’s your star sign, baby <insert suggestive leer>.

Each sign is broken up over 2 different months. So if you’re born between April 21 and May 21 you’re a Taurus, like me. Because of this, I can typically remember someone’s sign and birth month, to get to the general range of their birthday.

I sense that at this moment, some of you might be judging me. That’s okay. It’s a pretty typical reaction.

I’m not saying I super follow horoscopes. I don’t check necessarily every day. I don’t exactly base my life decisions off them. I’m not saying they’re true for everyone. It just so happens that I agree with mine, and I know several of my friends fit their zodiac sign perfectly.

One of my coworkers Krystal argues that the descriptions for each sign are vague, so that you could match any of them.

Well okay, let’s discuss this.

Some of the general traits for Sagittarius are:

-Positive, happy-go-lucky

-Impatient

-Impulsive

-Nature/animal lover

-Super ambitious

-Candid (kinda tactless)

That IS NOT me. I mean maybe you could argue that I’m a pretty positive person as well, but I am definitely not who I first think of when I read that description.

On the other hand, that’s almost a perfect description of my brother. Guess what my brother’s sign is? Yeah that’s right, Sagittarius.

Now you might not match every single trait for your sign. This is partly due to the fact that most people just look for their Sun sign, and ignore their Moon sign, which can play a part. I match my Sun sign so well that I feel comfortable ignoring anything else.

And while whenever the topic of horoscopes come up, people tend to laugh at me, within SECONDS they are asking me what their sign is and what it means about them. This has happened to me with women, men, old people, youngins, and serious skeptics. It’s like they have to deny it first, but then the curiosity is too much. And since they already denied it, if they don’t like what I say they can laugh it off again.

Not that I have every sign memorized at this point. Most of my friends have always been the same few signs, so those are the ones I really know.

And, of course, I know my Taurus traits, because I am such a Taurus.

Just a few common Taurus traits, both good & bad:

Physically, Taurus people are stocky (or for women, busty), have hair that is naturally curly or wavy, and have very large eyes.

There are very few Taurus traits I don’t have, but one is such a prominent trait that it saddens me. Taurus individuals generally have very distinctive voices, because that is the area ruled by our sign. They are often wonderful singers or speakers. As I’ve mentioned before, my voice sucks. It’s far too childish. Really, the only good thing you can say about it is that it’s incredibly expressive.

Ah well, none of us can be perfect.

Evil Sandwich Attack

Do you have any weird quirks that sometimes make you go “man, I wish I were normal?” For the most part I embrace my weirdness. I’m a proud neek. But there is a certain idiosyncrasy of mine that I WOULD ABSOLUTELY change if possible.

It’s my sandwich issue.

I am a picky eater. I will admit this. Certain tastes just don’t appeal to me. Certain textures make me want to gag. And let’s not even talk about smell.

The scary thing is that I’m actually much better with my eating tendencies than I used to be. My friends are amazed at all the stuff I can eat now that I used to reject. Part of it is just evolving taste buds. Part is my new willingness to try things with an open mind. The “open mind” bit is the important word there. I used to agree to try things, having already decided I wouldn’t like it. As a Taurus, once I decide something it’s a lost cause. I don’t care if you give me ambrosia, if I had already decided to dislike it, I will swear up and down it’s disgusting and never eat it again just to prove my point.

The main problem with me and food, and this hasn’t really changed, is that I don’t like anything complex. Very simple fare agrees with me. As a child, I practically existed off things like white rice, bread and butter, beef broth with noodles, and eggs. As I’ve grown I’ve started to like slightly more involved dishes. Yet I’m still not a fan when there’s too much included. So while I’ll eat chicken & gravy over biscuits, if you give me a casserole with chicken, mushrooms, onions, carrots, and cheese in it, I’m going to die a little inside. I like most of those things. I’d eat most of them separately, or in smaller combinations. I just don’t want everything added all together.

Food touching is another big issue. I don’t like to eat food that has other parts of food on it. If I’m eating mac & cheese and corn on the cob, and some of the corn touches some of the mac & cheese, I probably will not eat that bite of corn. There are some exceptions. Gravy is the exception king, but still I wouldn’t eat something like carrots that got gravy on them. Ew. I’m grossing myself out here. 

I don’t like this about myself. For one, it makes life difficult. I feel like a jerk whenever I order a hamburger with only ketchup. I hate myself a little when friends only mention dinner options when they know the restaurant has something I’d eat (although of course I adore them for putting up with me). And worst of all, I feel so guilty when I’m working and people provide lunch, that I have to eat it regardless.

This is my sandwich issue.

Almost every single other person in the world likes sandwiches. Amazingly enough, I have found one other person that dislikes them. God bless them; they’re my enabler. It’s not as bad now, as when I thought I was the only one.

But still, when people provide free lunch they stick to two choices: sandwiches or pizza. Pizza is the better option for me, because while I may or may not be very slightly allergic to tomatoes, I do like pizza, and I can pick off any weird toppings. However, since everyone knows everyone likes sandwiches, that’s almost always what they provide.

These are the sandwiches I like:

-peanut butter & jelly (but only grape jelly)

-roast beef (but only if it’s chunks of roast beef, I don’t like sliced deli meat)

-plain turkey (but only if it’s chunks of turkey, although if it’s sliced I’ll pick turkey over roast beef)

-grilled cheese (but I’m very particular about the cheese. Kraft is acceptable)

-the #11 at Jimmy John’s when there’s no mayo (and really this is new, and it’s drunk food, I can eat it sober but it’s kinda meh)

That’s it. Now how often do you think these are the sandwiches people get when bringing an assortment of sandwiches?

Yeah… make that never. So when I’m working somewhere and they’re so sweet to offer “free lunch!” I’m secretly just praying for the strength to eat whatever random sandwich they bring. Because sandwiches are the ultimate enemy of picky eaters that don’t like food touching.

There’s just so much food squished into one small, evil, little space. There are all kinds of sauces and spreads people want to add on. Everything I hate in the world has been brought into one disgusting morsel, and I need to eat it and smile and graciously thank the person for the meal.

I’m not ungrateful. I truly appreciate anyone providing lunch. And I’m super happy I live where I have easy access to food!! I just find it very challenging to both eat the sandwich and convincingly act like it’s delicious. I expend more energy into pretending I like it, and can only ever force myself to eat like half, at best.

I know, I know, first world problems and all that. I just wish this didn’t come up for me so often. Is it weird that I’d be happier if they just didn’t feed me lunch at all, and I skipped a meal, over having to choke down yet another sandwich?

Curse you John Montagu, (generally) credited inventor of the sandwich. This is your fault, sir. Once I get my time machine working, I plan to slap you soundly about the face. Maybe then I’ll finally stop stressing out over sandwiches. Or I could jump forward 5 years in the future, at which point maybe my taste buds would have continued to evolve, and I will like sandwiches. I can only hope.

And Then I Found $5

I don’t know who first came up with the concept of saying “and then I found $5” at the end of a story to make it interesting, but I feel like I need to use that phrase every single time I say anything. If I had an action figure, it would be my catch phrase (oddly appropriate actually considering I’m a little crazy about money).

It seems like every time I tell an extended story about myself or something interesting I heard from another person, at the end of the story I’m met with blank stares. They’re not always funny stories. Sometimes they’re just something quirky I think people might want to know. Yet constantly when I finish talking people just stare at me.

I don’t understand it! I mean yeah, sure, maybe some of my stories suck, but EVERY SINGLE ONE!? What goes wrong in my delivery?? I absolutely know some of the material is FASCINATING, so what am I doing wrong?!

On numerous occasions, I have been told I’m a funny individual. My friends have commented on my rather unique perspective. How does this not come through when I’m talking, and why do the SAME EXACT stories get lauded when I instead write them out??

There has to be something wrong with the way I talk. I’m not sure what it is, but I suspect my voice is to blame. Despite being a Taurus (the star sign of the throat, known for their voices in case you’re not hip on your astrology) I have the voice of an 8 year old on a sugar high. It’s probably hard to take me seriously. I sound like butterscotch and candy necklaces.

I have to say this issue causes me no end of grief, because I love telling stories. This is somewhat of a weird family habit. It initially started with my father at family dinners. He’d turn to somebody and say “tell me a story,” the idea being you’d tell the story of your day. Then he started doing it to random people visiting our house.

I took that habit and expanded on it in college, so it because almost an initiation rite in our group that when somebody brought somebody new over (whether a potential boyfriend, or an old friend from home), I’d turn to them and say “tell us a story!” And I didn’t make it easy. It couldn’t be a real story about their day. Oh no. It had to be a made up story that we found interesting. And to make it even better, we graded people based on their attempts.

Now this kind of random story I actually used to excel at. When I was young, I used to be very involved in church, and often went to overnights or camp where I was in a car/van/bus with a bunch of other bored young girls for an extended period of time. Clearly not a fun situation normally, but I quickly discovered when I started telling stories about the different worlds I had imagined, not only did the other girls listen and BEG me for new stories, the ADULTS even wanted to hear more.

It got to the point that even once we were at our destination, at night when everyone was winding down and trying to get ready for bed, they would come and ask me for more of my stories. This was actually why I first started writing. I had so many people at the church that wanted more of these stories, and I realized that people were going to miss parts when they weren’t around, and I couldn’t remember the exact same details every single time if I retold the story.

This inconsistency confuses me. I don’t understand how I can be (in theory) good at storytelling, but bad at telling stories. This weekend I was meeting a bunch of my brother’s new friends, and I swear to god every time I stared speaking I felt like I should just hold up my “and then I found $5” sign when I finished. Yet everyone seemed to like me well enough. Apparently nobody holds my inability to be interesting against me. I’d hold it against me, but I guess I don’t get a vote.

One of my fervent wishes is to someday understand what I’m doing WRONG when I tell stories now, so I can fix it. It’s really disheartening to get these weird stares every time I talk.