A Muse with a View

Originally published on MySpace on July 25, 2009

I must admit, it’s been about 20 years since I’ve been to a bachelorette party, so imagine my surprise when I recently received an invitation to one. My first thought was, oh God I hope this doesn’t involve young men dressed up as cops showing up at the door with a boom box. Thankfully no.

The plan was to take the bride, whom we’ll call Kate, to happy hour at a nearby restaurant, and then whisk her away to a secret location for a secret activity—that activity being a pole dancing class!

First of all let me point out that the median age of those in attendance was probably 48, with our friend Kate being the youngest at 32. And just to give you an idea of the personalities in the room, we all either have engineering degrees or work in engineering. Not your typical pole dancers.

I’m going to skip the happy hour festivities and go right to Diva Den, or the Den of Sin as I like to refer to it.

Unlike me, most of my female friends are very organized, think ahead, and prepare for events such as this. One such friend actually packed a cooler with iced tea, sweet tea vodka and some fruit for us to snack on during our pole dancing session. I personally don’t have a lot of inhibitions when it comes to trying new things, but one of my friends announced, “I’m a good Catholic girl. I think I need a drink before I try this!”

We all changed into our pole dancing clothes. What? You didn’t know there were pole dancing clothes? Okay, they weren’t really pole dancing clothes. I wore some Lycra running shorts and a tank top.

And then there were the shoes! Diva Den has a variety of “Hooker Heels” as I call them, that you can wear during your pole dancing lesson. Our instructor Brandi handed me a pair of 6-inch high silver platform stilettos and said, “Here, try these.”

If you’re going to learn how to pole dance you might as well look the part.

I have been threatened with legal action (okay not legal action, just verbal threats) if I post any of the party pictures here. But I think it’s okay if I just post a few that only include me.

The class started out with some stretching and “floor work.” Baby steps people! You can’t just start swinging on a pole without warming up and getting the basics down.

Brandi taught us how to walk sexy, crawl sexy, and generally move like you mean business. None of us were big fans of the floor work, because frankly, crawling across a wood floor on your knees is painful.

“Brandi,” I said with a look of utter desperation on my face, “how do you do this without the pain? My knees don’t like this.”

“You get used to it,” she said matter of factly. “You have to toughen up your body to do this.” And then she went on to explain that when she started attending and teaching these classes a year and a half ago, her arms and legs were covered with bruises for the first month. And I can tell you that when I woke up this morning I was sporting my own array of black and blue patches after just one lesson last night.

After the floor work, we finally got to pick a pole. Pick a pole? Aren’t they all the same? No. There are standard stainless steel poles, poles that have a smaller diameter for those with smaller hands, and even a copper pole, which is stickier (for those who get sweaty palms). I chose a standard stainless steel pole in the front of the room.

We spent the next 30 minutes doing the “Fireman,” the “Pinwheel,” and learning how to get up from those maneuvers without looking like a clutz.

The final session of the evening was a lap dance lesson. Brandi went through a lap dance for an imaginary friend on the couch, and then we each got a turn to try the routine.

“Who should I imagine on the couch?” I asked my gal pals. The consensus was that Johnny Depp would be the recipient of my lap dance, and I’m pretty sure he would have enjoyed it.

After our lap dance lesson we had some time to take pictures of each other doing our newly acquired pole tricks, which for the most part I can’t publish here. We then changed back into our street clothes.

We gave Brandi a nice tip, and headed out for a nightcap and a bite of this: The “Cock ‘n Balls” from Voodoo Doughnut (which happens to be two blocks from where I work).

If you are looking for an alternative to your daily, boring workout routine, I highly recommend adding pole dancing to your cross training. Many aerobics studios offer it, or you can find places like Diva Den that specialize in it.

Diva Den Studio

You can see me practice my pole dancing skills at Comedy Sportz on Sunday. Oh wait, wrong venue. Comedy Sportz is for improv comedy not pole dancing. But I am in the show on Sunday, and we have AC! It’s a minor league show so the cost is only $5 with a can of food for the Oregon Food Bank or $6 without a can.

Address here: Comedy Sportz Portland

Originally published on MySpace on April 28, 2009

Tomorrow is my youngest son’s birthday, and he asked for a Nintendo DS, to replace the one he lost last year. I agreed to pay for half since he lost the previous one, and off to Target we went tonight.

We arrive at the Target in Wilsonville and get Rock Star parking, which never happens at Target. The place is nearly empty.

My kids bolt from the car before I even have a chance to open my own door, and make a beeline through the front doors of Target, and straight to the Electronics section.

We quickly locate the Nintendo aisle, and the three of us stand there staring at the locked glass case, well stocked with Nintendo DS’s in red, blue, silver and black. Black?! Ooh new color.

We grab a friendly Target employee, because we know she has the keys to the Nintendo kingdom, and ask to see see “the black one.” It costs $50 more than the other DS’s and I want to know why.

I read the display card to my son, “It says it has a much bigger screen, a music player, and a built-in camera. Is that worth $50 extra to you?” I ask.

“I don’t know,” he says, then turns and looks at friendly Trarget employee Lisa. “Can we open it up and see it?”

“No,” she says. “Once we open them we can’t sell them anymore.”

“Okat,” I say, “Do you have one on display we can see, so we can compare the screen size?”

“No, we don’t have one on display,” she says. “But, let me see if I can open this without damaging the packaging.”

My son’s eys light up as we follow Lisa to the counter. She carefully lifts the tape with her fingernails, careful not to rip anything, opens the box, pulls out the documentation, and pulls out … a blob!

“Uh, that is not a DS,” I say. “What is that?”

“Oh my gosh!,” she exclaims. “It’s a rock covered in black electrical tape! I don’t know how this could have happened.”

Someone had purchased the DS, taken it home, removed the DS, and replaced it with a rock that weighed exactly the same as the DS. It was covered in black electrical tape so it would look like the black DS, just in case the person at the returns counter actually opened the box and looked under the documentation.

Can you just imagine buying that for a birthday gift, and seeing the disappoinment on the kid’s face when he opened the box up to find a rock!?

Needless to say. Lisa was happy to open every other DS we wanted tp look at.

My son ended up choosing a regular silver DS, because the “much larger” screen on the expensive black DS wasn’t actually that much bigger.

Oh, but the story doesn’t end here. As we checked out we saw this on the counter:

I looked at Lisa and said, “This just isn’t your day is it?”

Originally published on MySpace on April 27, 2009

Clarifications before you read the story:

CSZ: CSz is short for Comedy Sportz, which is an improv comedy
spot in NW Portland. We play games like they do on the show “Whose Line
is it Anyway?”

Andrew B.: A long-time friend and Comedy Sportz veteran, who was teaching one of the workshops on this particular evening.

Continue…

Last Wednesday night I had plans to meet my friend Andrew for a spot of
hot chocolate before the Comedy Sportz Wednesday night workshop. We
were supposed to meet in the CSz parking lot at 6:45pm.

But before I met Andrew I had to pick up a couple of cases of wine
glasses from my friend Julian in NW Portland. I texted Julian to tell
him I was my on my way, and he texted me back saying he wasn’t home.
And that’s where our story begins…

I started by sending the following text message to Andrew at 6:30pm:

Me: The person who has my wine glasses is not home. He forgot and went to happy hour. So I’m on my way to CSz.

“Andrew”: LOL. What? Who is this?

Me: Kelly Jo!

“Andrew”: Kelly Jo? Do you know who I am lmao?

Me: Not sure now! Who did I text?

(Holy crap! Who has Andrew’s phone?)

“Andrew”: Paul the auctioneer.

(WTF? Paul the auctioneer?)

Me: Ha ha. Well you’re programmed into my phone as Andrew. LOL

(Now I’m really confused)

Paul: Ha ha that’s pretty funny! Well I wonder what Andrew is doing now.

Me: I have no idea why your number is in my phone, but this is all pretty funny.

(Andrew and I met up for dinner before a workshop two months ago,
and I put his number into my phone. I swear it worked two months ago. I
wonder if he changed his number?)

Paul: Well do we know each other? What area are you in?

Me: I don’t know any auctioneers. I’m at Comedy Sportz in NW Portland. Where are you?

Paul: I’m in Salem area. Did you punch the number into your phone address book or is the phone your other half’s maybe?

(I’m texting n auctioneer in Salem. Really? What are the odds?!)

Me: It has been programmed into my phone for two months! I swear it worked last time. ;^)

Paul: LOL! Hmmmmm, are you male or female?

(Okay, we seem to be headed somewhere I don’t want to go. The next question will be, “What are you wearing?”)

At this point Andrew pulls up next to me in the parking lot.

“Andrew! I tried texting you to tell you I was early and I got Paul the auctioneer!,” I said, totally confused. “I’m pretty sure I have your cell phone number in my cell phone from last time.”

I read Andrew the number, and it turns out I had the area code as Portland not Vancouver. Right number, wrong area code. DOH!

“Hey!” I said, “What kind of auctioneer do you think Paul is? Do you think he auctions livestock or stuff?”

“What? Are there only two categories?” Andrew said.

“Let’s just ask and find out.” So I texted Paul…

Me: What do you auction? Livestock or stuff?

Paul: Everything but livestock.

“See Andrew!” I said, “Two categories. Livestock and stuff.”

“What do you think he looks like?” I said.

Andrew just looked at me, totally deadpan and said, “I think he has an unfortunate mustache.” And if I had had any hot chocolate in my mouth at that time it would have catapulted out my nose!

“Hey! How do you think one becomes an auctioneer? Is there a college degree? Associates degree? Does it run in the family?” I said. “Let’s ask.”

Me: Awesome. How do you become an auctioneer? Do you get a degree or was your dad an auctioneer? How long have you been doing it?

Paul: Ten years. I went to auction school in Missouri. I love it!

Auctioneer school in Missouri! No kidding. Andrew and I got a lot of
mileage out of our exchange with Paul the auctioneer that night. It
still peppers our conversations.

Not all wrong numbers are wrong. Some are informative and entertaining!

Originally published on MySpace on January 29, 2009.

I ran the Carlsbad Marathon last Sunday in 4:15:10! And I felt
great afterwards. That’s a 9:45 minute mile in case you’re wondering.

That’s me crossing the finish line on the far right. I finished 11th
in my division, and in the top third overall (men and women).