I don't think I'm fooling anyone...

There is a part of me that I have tried so very hard to keep hidden from the world. A secret part of me, that I hoped would go by unnoticed, that people would simply overlook it. I hoped, quite simply, that my true nature would not be revealed to the world at large, because if it was, there was no hope for me socially.

I guess as a teenager I really hoped that other teenagers (clearly the people I needed to impress the most) would one day discover I was really cool. I had a sad habit of trying to reinvent myself every year. It never worked. So you would think that at some point, I would have given in and just been me. But no, I worked very hard to maintain some illusion of being moderately cool even as I moved into adulthood. But now I have done something so unbelievably uncool, that there may be no hope for me what-so-ever, and everyone will know that I am a big fat NERDY GEEK FACE!

I began watching Battlestar Galactica, and I like it.

And I guess that wouldn't have been so bad, if it hadn't have been for a comment I made tonight at Community Group. The subjects of my rats came up, and I said "Rats make great pets." To which someone replied, "Oh you mean like Scabbers?" and I shot back "NO! SCABBERS IS EVIL!" Because I was legitimately offended that anyone would compare my rats to the faithful servant of the Dark Lord, or more importantly the dirty stinking rat responsible for the death of Lily and James Potter. Unforgivable! (Did I mention that I once saved an article from a magazine because they used the word "voldamortian" like it was a real word? Genius.)

So I guess I have to finally come out of the Geek closet (which I realize isn't a surprise to 99% of you). And in honor of finally publicly embracing my horribly uncool self, I will make a list of very geeky things about myself.

1. I watch Battlestar Galactica... and I like it. I like it so much that I have been Netflix marathoning it for close to a week straight. I'm halfway through season two. I don't know why I waited this long to check it out. Resistance was clearly futile.

2. My Christmas list includes the following two items...

This one is clearly, a gryffindor sweater. (I'm loom knitting a scarf to match)

And THIS is a wand that you can program as a universal remote for your TV... so instead of pressing buttons, you flick it different ways to control your TV. Also, it must be noted that I promised the hubs that if he got me this for Christmas, I would play Settlers of Cataan with him.

3. My butt looked like this when I attended the midnight book release of Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows. (And yes, I am wearing Gryffindor colors... so sue me.)

(If we could have a moment of silence for Borders where this photo was taken... You were an amazing bookstore and you will truly be missed.) Fun facts though, not only is my butt right... but I read that book in 9 hours straight, from midnight to 9am that night, and then spent the next week or so irritated because no one else had finished it and I didn't have anyone to talk about it with.

4. My favorite video game of all time is Pokemon for the game boy. It doesn't really matter which version, except for yellow. I didn't like yellow because you HAD to start out with Pikachu and the first gym leader was Brock who only uses Rock Pokemon and Electric Pokemon are USELESS against Rock Pokemon so you pretty much had to spend WAY too much time catching OTHER Pokemon and building up their strength so that you might have a decent chance at beating the FIRST FREAKIN GYM LEADER! Unfair to make it so hard so fast in my opinion.

5. You know what I got in trouble for growing up? Reading. That's right... I got in trouble for reading too much. Or rather, I got in trouble for reading with a flashlight under my covers at night instead of being asleep. Or reading under my desk when I was supposed to be doing math. More than once in Jr High I got in trouble for trying to sneak INTO the library.

6. "What's that got to do with the price of peas in Persopolis?" (If you know where this quote is from, congratulations... you and I have the same taste in literature. If you use this in your every day language like I do, Congratulations... you are a big fat nerdy geek face.)

7. I read textbooks for fun... but only the ones I find interesting. Also, when I am really bored, I have a habit of finding (and reading) really weird books. I once found a book in my Grandparents' basement that said you could tell whether or not a person was introverted or extroverted by how much their mouth watered when you put a drop of lemon juice on their tongue, which sounds crackpot to me. But the book also said that people who dream always in color and almost always remember their dreams are the most creative and intelligent... and I do both of those things... so I'd like to go on believing the book was correct. Never mind that it was written in the 70s.

8. www.thinkgeek.com has a taun-taun sleeping bag with a zipper pull shaped like a lightsaber and the inside fabric is designed to look like guts. If you don't think that's cool... there is something very wrong with you in my book. Also, come to think of it, pretty much everything on that website is awesome. If you've never checked it out GO THERE!!! If you don't find anything awesome or hilarious on that website, you might actually be a normal human being.

9. I played Dungeons and Dragons in Junior High and High School by choice. And I had fun doing it. Its probably because of this that I find the Order of The Stick web comics so hilarious. I am often ashamed that I get 99% of the jokes in it.

10. I recently got into a discussion involving the TARDIS which did not involve any of the following key words "Doctor", "Who", "TARDIS", and yet I knew exactly what we we talking about. The other person in the conversation then proceeded to say "Which ones your favorite?" And I said "The 10th hands down." and He said "well so and so's is definitely the 9th, but I prefer the Tom Baker years myself." I would like to point out that this was only the second conversation I had ever had with this person and neither one of us INTENTIONALLY brought up ANYTHING to do with Doctor Who. Our natural flow of conversation just led us to it.

So there you go. I'm a big geek. I won't try to hide it anymore. I don't think I was doing a very good job to begin with. I guess I will just go on having discussions about muggle quidditch in public and hope that nobody judges me if i accidentally say "frak" in a conversation. Thank goodness I'm not a Trekkie and I don't play WoW!

Some White People Things I Saw in Denver

My trip to Denver, Colorado in Pictures... White People Pictures.


But If your kid isn't Gifted... clearly this school won't help them out at all.


Here we are enjoying ethnic food! In this case Japanese Soda! Mine's Creamy Melon flavored.


THE FARMERS MARKET! I bought coffee.


Smelling a spicy chai tea at a tea store. Notice all the teas behind the store clerk.


Whole foods! Because Remember, we buy organic... and fair trade... and other white people things..

So there you go. Some white people things I saw in Denver. It was an awesome awesome trip. Possibly the best weekend I have had in a long time.

Because every skin tone is beautiful...

Here is the thing about Malls. They make you feel bad about yourself. I'm pretty sure that's how they make all their money. And that makes sense. I mean a place that makes its money primarily on clothing stores wants you to think that the clothes you have are out of date, out of style, and out of your grandmothers closet. I grew up in the land of Malls, and spent much of my sad and pathetic adolescence trying desperately to reinvent myself every school year. (Helpful tip: It never works. No body's opinion of you has changed over the summer.) Then I moved to Alaska, and BOY did life get better. I mean sure, there are still people who dress better than I do, but mostly people don't care so much about that. Also, I got married. So I guess since I always have someone telling me what a Hottie I am, I don't worry about how I look too much.

But recently I was back in the land of lypo, and luis vitton, and I went to the mall. This is the mall I went to:

I went to this mall as a kid. Well, I mean this part of the mall (it's outdoor courtyard) wasn't there when I was a kid. It's gotten considerably more pompous and snobby in the last few years.

I went to this mall to help my friend find layers to keep her warm in England this year. And it started out harmlessly enough, and I was doing good... until we went into Sephora. If you don't know, that's a make-up store. A HUGE store wall to wall full of beauty products. It was my mistake really. I asked if we could go in. Then once I was in I remembered that I mostly don't wear make-up, and when I do I feel like I never really do a good job. And soon I began to feel really really bad about myself. Which put me into a poopy mood.

(Number One rule of Mall shopping: NEVER go feeling poopy. You ALWAYS make sure you look your hottest. Here is why... Pretend you are a castle. A Castle's primary job is defense right? So when you build your castle you build extra high and thick walls so that when the enemy invariably comes to rough up your peasants, steal your gold, and make off with your lady friend, it takes them a lot more time, effort, and supplies to accomplish that. If the Mall is your enemy, and you are the castle, then your confidence in your hotness is your walls. Without a strong and firm belief in your attractiveness, your walls will crumble and the enemy will get you.)

So after that, I was drowning in shallow pathetic-ness (and sadly the hubs was not there to shamelessly make out with me in public to make me feel better.) The last stop of the day was the MAC booth in Macy's. My friend wanted to get some awesome Mascara for looking hot in England, and while she was at it, she decided she wanted to invest in a nice lipstick. Now important to this story is knowing that my friend is Ethnic. She is Chexian, which if you don't know, is half Chinese and half Mexican. And she is a HOTTIE! We still have arguments with each other about who is prettier (her saying me, and me saying her... I'm right.) So because she can't find a lipstick that she thinks is nice on her own, she asks the MAC lady (who is white). Only it turns out that the MAC lady is no help, and my friend begins to feel more and more frustrated. Finally when the lady walks off to go help someone else, my friend mutters "White people have no idea what to do with brown skin."

Man, I felt so bad for her. All she wanted was to find a color that looked nice on her skin, and instead all she got was a whole lot of self doubt and feeling icky. I guess that's something I don't think about, which is probably because I think people with brown skin are so lucky. But most make-up IS designed for white people, and most people probably AREN'T trained to know how to do make-up on people with brown skin. So even though walking into a make-up store might make me feel bad about myself because I don't wear make-up and don't look perfect 90% of the time, at least finding make-up that works on me would be super easy. So in conclusion... Malls are stupid, make-up is even stupider, and all skin tones are beautiful, especially my friend's. MAC should get with the program, because they have no business making someone as gorgeous as her feel bad about themselves.



Isn't she stunning? I love her!

White People Wednesdays

I have learned that vacation is not conducive to blogging. So far, I have mostly managed to keep up with doing White People Wednesdays only. But now that I am now home (and I mean just home. Our plane landed in Anchorage this morning at 1:15. We left Anchorage somewhere around 2:30 or 3:00. Paused somewhere in Denali Park for a nap. And then napped again when we got to Nenana, and finally arrived home at 10:30am.) Bethany is sleepy and tired and cranky and hungry cause there ain't a lot of food in de house. So I'm gonna do a White People Wednesday post, visit a friend, and maybe take me a nap. Remember that you can view all the things that white people like by going to the website www.stuffwhitepeoplelike.com.

#17: Hating their parents- I must admit that this is trend among many of my peers. And I have been occasionally guilty of complaining about my parents, especially when I was a teenager. But the truth is, I have great parents, and I love them. They were neither too strict nor too lax. They weren't perfect parents, but being human sort of makes that impossible for anyone to be a perfect parent.

#18: Awareness- Apparently, this is solving the worlds problem via awareness? This makes me think of a commercial I saw one time at the movies. It was celebrities talking about a disease. The kind where they film them one at a time in black and white, and they each list a statistic and try and make you care and donate money or something. And at the end, they revealed what the disease was... Influenza...aka the flu. I really thought it was a waste of commercial. They would have been better off making a commercial about AIDS or something. In the end, awareness brings light to a problem, but its only by doing we can fix things.

#19: Traveling- I LOVE TO TRAVEL! And I do both First and Third World. I have been to Canada (which I know doesn't really count), Mexico four times (three of which were NOT in resort towns), and Barbados. The hubs and I might go live in Japan for a year, and we are planning on visiting our friends in Scotland. Also, I love Airports. Even if I am not going anywhere I always get excited when i am in a Airport. I loves me some travel.

White Points: 11 (I counted awareness as half a point.)
Non-White Points: 7 (Remember I counted awareness as half a point.)

White People Wednesdays

Holy Cow this week has been crazy! My mother and Grandmother are running me ragged. So far since last Wednesday, we have gone to a family reunion, hiked up a mountain to a lake, Jet boat toured the Rogue river (which led me and the hubs to come up with a SUPER AWESOME raft down the Rogue with a big group of people family vacation plan. Be jealous.), and drove to/hiked around and down to Crater Lake. Its been a lot, so pretty much I come back exhausted and then have to get up early again to go onto the next thing. Vacationing is hard work! On the upside, mi madre bought me (and also technically the hubs) a brand new camera for our anniversary!!! Since my old one was pretty much broken and crappy.

Here is a picture of the new one:


Its a beautiful plum color. You can't tell in this picture because my Grandparents have crappy lighting in their house and its dark. I've pretty much been lusting after this camera for something close to six months, and I'm pretty stoked that I have it. Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on how you look at it), because it has 14 mega pixels I don't have enough ram on my computer for the pictures to behave properly, so now I have to upgrade my ram.

Anywho now it is Wednesday, and so once again its time to update the running tally on how White I am. Last week, white people points were barely in the lead! Remember that you can see the full list of stuff white people like on www.stuffwhitepeoplelike.com.

#14: Having Black Friends- Oh jeez... I am so guilty of this one. I love having black friends. I think they are very cool and interesting, and have very pretty skin. And I admit, that maybe... just maybe... as an added side note, I feel like I appear less racist to OTHER black people if I have black friends. But mostly, mostly I like my black friends because they are very cool people. Sadly, I have this horrible horrible problem where when I talk to people who ethnically belong to a controversial issue (either in the present or the past), I feel compelled to talk about it. When I talk to German people, I want to talk about their thoughts on WW2, Hitler, and the holocaust. And when I talk to Black people, I want to talk about slavery. *Sigh* I have to work really hard keeping my stupid big mouth shut.

#15: Yoga- Here is my thing with Yoga... I think its a really fun and trendy thing to do. In my head taking weekly Yoga classes is a small part of my "perfect life" (which incidentally never included living in Alaska... hmmm). I did Yoga videos with my friend when I was living at her house and it was AWESOME! You totally felt better afterwards, like everything in your body was aligned or something. What I don't like about Yoga is how hard it is to find either a yoga class or a yoga video where they take the eastern spirituality out of it. I don't like the Hindu-y undertones (or really obvious overtones sometimes). It makes me feel spiritually squirmy... so instead I tend to do Pilates... or Zumba!!! But not gonna lie, LOVE the way I feel after doing Yoga. Also, I love my Yoga pants. (they currently have holes in them. I need to go to American Apparel while I'm in the lower 48 and get a new pair.)

#16: "Gifted" Children- Well, I agree. This is a trend among white people. But as I do not have any children yet, I cannot go on and on about how gifted they are. Though I am absolutely positive that they will be gifted, and here is why. I was a gifted child. That's right. I'm special, and I don't mean in an ED sort of way. I started talking at 9 months. I started walking at 10 months. And by age 4 I could read a book all by myself. And I don't mean I memorized a book that I liked a lot (I did that when I was two). No, I mean, you hand me a book I had never read before, and I could read it. Granted, I may not have been reading at a Junior High Level at that point, but I could read. On a side note I was reading at a college level in Junior High. Oh boy I love bragging! See, so I was gifted. I'm sure my children will be gifted. And even if they aren't OBVIOUSLY gifted, I will find something for them to be gifted about, because lets be honest, good parents always find something their kids do to brag about. I will be no exception.

Well that all puts white people stuffs in the lead... so much for a neck and neck race.

White Points: 9.5
Non-White Points: 5.5

Here is a picture of my legs blinding people when exposed to direct sunlight. It was taken with my new camera! :)


Very sad side note: This is after my legs have been sunburned three of four times in the last week. And they are STILL white. I hope all of my children are born with my hubby's skin genes. He tans.

Sunburn, My Old Friend

Its been a while since I saw you last,
And frankly I was glad
to think that you had left for good.
I was certain that you had.

I'd thought I'd learned to keep you out,
a life that's UV free.
Instead I find you snuck back in.
Why can't you leave me be?

So now I've gone from white to red,
a lobster in the pot.
My cells are mutating as we speak.
IS THAT CANCER OR A SPOT?!?!

White People Wednesdays

So very very tired! Arrived today in Oregon, which I think is a White People Mecca. It seems to me that lots of white people live here anyway. I came this close (I guess you can't see how close this close is... pinch together your thumb and forefinger, now slightly separate them. That close.) to not posting today. But I guess as you can see, I'm doing it anyway, so here goes. Last I checked, we had just finished number 9. Remember that you can view the entire list at www.stuffwhitepeoplelike.com

#10: Wes Anderson movies- I have never ever seen a Wes Anderson movie. And I'm not about to start now! (I'm feeling white people rebellious today)

#11: Asian Girls- Oh gosh I just love Asian girls! Actually I'm lying... I do not have a weird thing for Asian girls. Though to be fair in this post, they admit that this one doesn't really pertain to white women, so maybe I won't count it. Which means I think today I will do four. (Though to be fair, I do know quite a few white guys who really do have a thing for asian women.)

#12: Non-Profit Organizations- I think that non-profits are good! I had an internship at a non-profit once for six months. Its nice to be able to help people without having to make sure they can pay you. And I admit, its does make you feel really good about yourself when you can help out the disadvantaged. (Of course, on the other hand, I rarely every give homeless people cash. Most of the time because I don't carry cash. Oooh one time I had a case of Vanilla Coke and so I gave this homeless guy one. He seemed disappointed. But anyway, I do really like helping people, I guess I shouldn't worry about what the homeless are dong with my money.)

#13: Tea- I like green tea, and peppermint tea when I am sick. But mostly tea is just a big disappointment to me. Take apple flavored tea. It smells delicious, but when I drink it does NOT taste like apple cider. I would rather have apple cider, or coffee. Tea is not my preferred warm beverage.

White Points: 6.5
Non-White Points: 5.5
(remember, Asian girls do not count for me... because I am not a white male.)