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Mon, January 31

Impulse Buy

I didn't use my best judgement yesterday...My parents called me at noon to tell me they were coming into the city to take my brother to brunch at 2:30. "Lexi you should come!" my mom urged. I had just eaten grilled cheese and tomato soup that J made for me, but knew that in two hours, I might be able to eat a little something...and drink a little something: We were going to ESSEX on the Lower East Side, where brunch includes three alcoholic beverages.

The whole mishbucha was there: Grandpa, Ash, her friend Hannah, Justin, Mom, Dad. Mom drank hers and Grandpa's share of mimosas. I think she forgot that we weren't in a cheezy restaurant in Jersey, and slipped the Mexican busboy five bucks for giving us extra bread (I hope that was the reason!)

I had planned on getting a manicure, and told Justin that that was where I was off to after brunch. Now, since my brother started college his hygiene habits have been quite questionable. We never were sure how often he showered. And just yesterday he told my parents that he'd been putting toilet paper down to sit on HIS OWN TOILET at home because he hadn't cleaned his bathroom since August. I was impressed a few weeks ago when he told me he started getting his eyebrows waxed, and even more delighted when he said he'd come with me to get a manicure too!

En route to my favorite cheap nail spot (on Allen St.--only $6 !!!), we passed a very nice body jewlery shop. What does a very nice body jewlery shop look like, you ask? Well, it was CLEAN for one thing. The jewelry wasn't jumbled together, wasn't made of plastic, and the woman who worked there didn't have a slightly drugged look nor tattoos covering every inch of her face. She had a "Gray's Anatomy" book. The jewelry was titanium or gold (not surgical steel.) They even (gasp) sanitized each piece of jewelry before they pierced you with it! This certainly was no "Andromeda" (on St. Mark's).

Justin had told me that my new nose ring resembled a "silver booger", because the inside ring kept on falling down and hanging out my nostril. The girl at the store was kind enough to fix the ring for free.

But before we left, Justin asked me a very dangerous question: "What do you think about an eyebrow ring, on me?"

This may sound wierd, but my heart races at the idea of new accessories, especially semi-permanent ones. I love getting highlights. I loved getting my tattoo. Thrilled with the nose ring. I would get another tattoo or another piercing, but since I'm a working girl and not a college kid on spring break, I think that ship has sailed..Anyway, I liked the idea of living vicariously through Justin. And I was excited to be a part of his experience...I was the "cool sister." I more than condoned this piercing decision--I cheered it on.

So why was I SURPRISED when, after telling my parents about Justin's new look, that they were absolutely LIVID?

"Justin is trying to get into medical school. What were you thinking? How can he go on interviews looking like this?," asked my dad, who was the one who pierced my belly button in 11th grade. My dad, who even though he is a physician now, used to dream of playing in a rock band and never wore shoes when he was Justin's age. This is a man who never yells, and usually tells other people (for example, mom) that they are overreacting.

And he was yelling at me!

"Uh...I...Hm. I didn't think about that." I stammered.

I felt like I was back in high school. Except, this never happened to me in high school.

My mother called me every hour on the hour to tell me just how stupid "this idea of yours" (mine) was. Why wasn't my brother getting reprimanded? He was smart: He turned his phone off last night, and today he declared that he was stuck in bed with a stomach virus. Yeah...so he says.

Ugh.

Anyway. The rest of the weekend was great. Saturday night I saw a Martin Sexton concert with J and his friends, and the opening act was that chick who sang "I Kissed a Girl" a song that I remember was highly overplayed on Z-100 in 1995.

Jen and I separated from J who had to go uptown to an engagement party, and met Care and Aly at Scopa where a college friend was celebrating his birthday. Care and Aly were hoping to run into old flames/crushes, but oddly enough, NO ONE from Columbia was there. It seemed to just be the birthday boy, his girlfriend, and her roomate's friends.

We had fun just talking and dancing with each other. Of course, any time a drunk guy sees girls dancing with each other (non-provocatively) or just hanging out SANS MALES, he will assume that they must be bored to tears. At least I am prettty sure that is what a man must be thinking, because I never get away with this kind of thing without some asshole saying, "Hey girls--what are you doing here by yourselves?" (i.e. without men) or "Come on, let me and my friend (insert name of some Jerk here) show you a good time."

Three guys came up to us and instructed Jen to "treat his friend like a dancing pole". And when she looked at him like he was on crack, and proceeded to ignore him, he came back later to say, "So why aren't you showing my friend a good time?" I also love this one. The whole "my friend" thing. Like, two or three guys will come up to a group of girls, and the greasy one will step forward, as if he's not a stranger, and instead is a close friend of yours whose opinion you'd trust and he'll say, "You should meet my buddy here, Matt."

Why can't "Matt" introduce himself?

"Meet my mute friend Matt", he should say.

We finally left Scopa and gave Mercury Bar on 3rd Ave. a try. No luck. Way too young a crowd, dancing in an even more risquee manner than the girls who danced the sluttiest way in my day (ok, fine, sluttier than the way I used to dance in college). An Irish guy named John approached me and asked me something that he had to repeat six times until I realized that through his drunken slurring and the loud hip hop music, he'd asked me if he could "chat me up"? I also hate when people ask permission to chat, while they are in the process already of having struck up a conversation. Or at least attempted to.

I told him, no, thanks, I'm having fun with my friends. I know, hard to believe, fun without boys but there you go. (sigh)

So I guess this is what I'm missing out on, not being a single girl anymore.

Posted by lexzog at January 31, 2005 10:37 PM

Comments

Oh Lexi, your Mom and Dad are absolutely 100% correct on the eyebrow piercing thing for Justin. Not only would I never permit a doctor to touch me sporting a facial piercing of any kind, but I wouldn't permit that person to work in my hospital...well maybe in the laundry?!? It is not simply a matter of taste. We're talking hygiene, potential for infection and the spreading of disease, in addition to being still viewed as radically counter culture.

Yes, I am over 30 and therefore "the enemy," but I represent the views of the typical administrator or director of admissions, who, hopefully is also over 30 with two feet firmly planted on terra firma. Why? Justin's eyebrows aren't even a place to which I would want to draw attention!

Rock musicians, okay...beatnik poets in the village, sure...but someone I would entrust with my health, money, or legal matters...NIX!

What goes in can easily come out, thank goodness and when enough professionals get on his case about the tastelessness of his impetuous choice, I'm hoping he makes, what Mom and Dad know is, a better decision. Out with it.

Let him tattoo his butt or pierce something patients and the admissions office won't get a look at. Let him feel secretly sexy without giving the whole family non stop waves of nausea. Boy do I feel old, but that's where I draw my line and I'm easy.

Posted by: KZN FLS at February 1, 2005 06:49 PM

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