According to Jenny the Bloggess, today is Blog Action Day. Jenny's tackled the issue of Amputee Porn For All, and I don't think I can add more to her well-reasoned argument except to say that my husband has long been a proponent of porn for the less fortunate.
But today, I'm going to take my own stand, and start my own coalition. It's called Citizens Against Inaccurate IDs. Or CAII!!!!!!!!!!!! for short. Because that's what Ninjas sound like before they rend the flesh from your bones. (Those are Ninjas, right?)
I recently had the misfortune of having to renew my Driver's License at the DMV. The last time I had to do this it was 2002; my body was about 30 pounds thinner and my bank account was 30 pounds heavier. I thought that life didn't get better than that. Until I stood in line waiting to get my picture taken.
A Mentally Retarded Gentleman struck up a conversation with me. I'm always thankful when people start conversations with me in public, as I have a tendency to talk to myself, forgetting that I'm not at home in an oversized t-shirt and a pair of torn panties tippy-tapping at the keyboard talking out character voices and plot points while silently wondering where that last pair of sweatpants went. (Answer: they disintegrated.)
But here I was out in public at the DMV, although still sans pants (I was wearing a skirt as I had already ventured out, so I might as well make a day of it.) In fact, I was wearing a skirt, a pair of motorcycle boots, and my bright green Lucky Charms "Magically Delicious" t-shirt and someone thought I looked pleasant enough to talk to. I turned and smiled and he told me that he was here to get his ID taken. I responded that I was here to get my Drivers' License photo. We crept up, person by person, toward the front.
Right before I was called forward to get my photo taken, the my Partner in DMV Conversation Crime looked me up and down and said
I bet you are Magically Delicious.
And then he smiled.
I blinked once, twice, and realized I had just gotten sexually harassed by a Mentally Retarded Guy.
My license came out looking like this:
Last week, I went to the DMV. Yesterday, I got this in the mail:
You know what's wrong with this picture?
It's better than I look on a daily basis.
When I get pulled over, stuffed in my too-tight coffee-stained jeans 'cause I'm too poor and stubborn to buy new ones, a faded and ripped Aqua Teen Hunger Force T-shirt, my greasy hair piled on top of my head and my glasses askew from hitting myself in the eye with the straw from my iced coffee, I'm going to be arrested for stealing that nice Nina Bargiel's pink Mini Cooper and Driver's License. As I'm hauled off to LA County Women's Correctional Facility, I will scream wildly but I'm the slackmistress! and people will shake their heads sadly and murmur that woman would never get hit on by a Mentally Retarded Gentleman.
When I get out of prison, I will end up having to do fake Amputee Porn to pay my bills. Thankfully, Jenny's got me covered.
...
When it comes to global poverty - a subject that I know little about (not because I don't care, mind you, but because I prefer to work on issues closer to home where I can see my direct influence, because I am selfish and petty and oh yeah, I like dogs) one of my favorite organizations is Heifer International. Find out what they do here. Around the holidays, I have been known for getting people cows and pigs and sheep because honestly, a water buffalo is way more awesome and how many soap-filled gift baskets can one person get?
