Take No Prisoners

Theo's first day in underpants didn't go so hot. I walked in to school and saw his pants and underpants wadded up in a plastic baggie on top of his stuff, and said to him, "Theo, did you pee in your underpants??" and he gleefully shouted out, "yeah!!!" Uh boy. This may not be the slam-dunk I was hoping for!!!

In other news, I got slut shamed on Facebook late Tuesday night. Yep. It was my old "friends" at it again - the two guys who have had a hard on for me since one of them didn't make finals in my contests in September. In this episode, it was a picture of them and an old boyfriend of mine that I dated about 17 years ago, who later became a real menace and is the one I just had to ban from my event for sexual assault. Although he's been around I haven't actually spoken to him since about 2001 because I think he's just a big jerk (and apparently a sexual assaulter now too). We were never really together - it was a kind of dance partner/friends with benefits type deal. So anyway, my "friends" focus on this guy in the picture and start talking about how they'd never seen me happier than when I was with him, maybe I need to get with him again so I can be happy again, and a variety of other wink-wink nasty put downs of me, how they have video "evidence" (of some dance routine we did but the implication of something else), and of course bringing my event into it to trash it again. 

I got on and told them what would make me happiest is if they would leave the scene permanently. One of them said "we were talking about Hillary Clinton". Then I told them I was officially dropping them from my Hall of Fame - which I followed by immediately taking them off the list of Hall of Famers on my website. Being a Hall of Fame member also means lifetime free entrance to my event. Like I'm going to keep that privilege for people who treat me like this? What kind of a fucking doormat do they take me for?

At this point it was 2 AM so I just went to bed. The next morning the entire thread had been deleted, but some friends in my feminist group shared screenshots with me in which their stupid brain dead girlfriends vilified me for taking away their status that they "earned". Whatever. The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. 

One of the guys involved sent me a groveling private apology, which I answered today in very harsh tones. He's done this many times - gone off online and then sends a private apology that his friend, the other guy, will never know about and think he's a pussy for sending. I told him it means nothing unless he makes it public. Which he won't. So that's that.

This whole situation to me is very similar to that guy who emailed to tell me I need to be removed from the stage when waiting to sing because I'm not constantly smiling. It's not about not being a good performer. It's about men desperately needing to control women - their appearance, their bodies, their sexual lives. These guys know how embarassed I am that I ever dated that asshole, and they know I banned him, so they did this solely to humiliate and discredit me (hence the term slut shame). It had nothing to do with kidding around. It was an intentional jab and character assassination. 

So I hurt them in the best way I could - took away the one legacy they could have left this world, their Hall of Fame status. Oh, they can still come to my event. But from now on they fucking pay me.

So I'm continuing my post-election Take No Prisoners attitude. I created a playlist for music on my phone called "Rage" and it's been my soundtrack. Here is my new FB profile picture:

 

Potties and Hotties

Today Theo's preschool teachers asked if I'd be willing to send him to school in underpants starting next week. Woo-hoo!

Truth be told Theo has been peeing and pooping on the potty for some time now, but I've been pretty inconsistent about keeping it going, partly because every time I ask if he wants to try he says no, and I don't want to force it, so I just leave it alone. But the babysitter has him on the potty every time she's here and he does great. I need to really commit to making potty training happen. I want to make sure he's able to advance to the next class at school which can only happen if he's out of diapers. Here we go! 

The craziness of my opening night settled pretty quickly - a few days of intense paperwork and all 340 people were manually typed into the system by me, and now I can go back to focusing on preparing for this year's taxes which is going to be extremely complicated. 

So tomorrow is Valentine's Day. I have a singing gig so there will be no big romantic plans, but I'll say things are really good between me and the BF and I'm really pleased with the way things are going. This time last year I was not in such a great place - I was seven pounds heavier and none of my clothes fit, I was fed up to the gills with his smoking, and not feeling very good about us. I never would have imagined a year later he'd be a non-smoker, living with me, and that I would feel really good about it all. So for that I am truly thankful.

 

Opening night, part XX

So I opened for registration on Wednesday night.

The good news is, as opposed to last year's record of 125 people, this year I got over 300 people, about 200 in just a couple of minutes.

The bad news is, I was offering tiered pricing (as I have for the past few years), and the first two tiers sold out in about a minute. And people freaked out. I spent the entire night until about two AM fielding furious emails, phone calls and Facebook messages accusing me of running a scam, because "there's no way they sold out that fast". The meanness and conspiracy theory nature of these people seems to be coming from our general political environment. I had to offer several refunds, and offer many explanations and some apologies. About 50 people were happy (they got the big discount), and then another 300 or so were pissed off. And all I got out of it was a loss of $5,000 in how cheap those early prices were. So what, exactly, is the point?

Next year I think I'll offer a "24 hour sale" - think of a price I can live with, and offer it for the first day only, which is something people grasp a lot better than a tier that sells out. That way I'll get the money I need up front and people won't feel cheated. Win-win. 

So opening night was great and it also fucking sucked. Which I think is going to be the mantra for this difficult, giant year I have ahead of me - my big 20th anniversary - it's going to be huge, and it's going to be insanely stressful. 

I went to a march for healthcare on Saturday. Is there a chance California could enact its own universal healthcare? It's a long shot, but I am interested in the possibility. I met some interesting people, and one weird woman who hated the women's march and thought our pink hats were stupid. Pffft whatever, lady! Nobody asked you.

Today we had a fun day at a kid's birthday party. The boys' party s set for April 1st, since every weekend is booked at the space I want until then. Luckily the kids are too little to understand when their actual birthdays are, so hopefully they won't mind. Here's a pic from the party today that the boyfriend took while spinning him around. It's pretty much my favorite picture of him ever.