Here’s the big news!
I should probably have mentioned this when it came out, but I was too busy thinking it was all a dream. You see, I got to write about the WWE for The Washington Post. And it really happened. So go read it! But watch this first to get in the mood.
RIP.
Stop laughing. Curling is a righteous game that deserves the world’s respect. Despite the Norwegian men’s team’s pants. Or maybe because of those pants.
In any case, I’ve been appointed the official curling correspondent for The Washington Post, so bookmark your browser. And in case you missed my curling coverage thus far, here ya go. You’re welcome!
Norway’s men’s curling team’s secret weapon: a psychologist
U.S. women’s curling team is down four straight losses: Can they come back?
Olympic curling still struggling to be taken seriously
U.S. curling teams still down but not out
Even the Nationals are curling fans
No, curlers are not slovenly — they’re hot
Like football? Then you’ll love curling
Curling brooms, Newton’s first law of motion and why curling may be cooler than baseball
How to get the United States more serious about curling
Actually, just refer to the “Published Work” page of this site. That’ll just be easier.
Baller.
Should you care to watch me try not to embarrass myself on stage, then I’ll see you at The Wonderland Ballroom this Friday, Feb. 15, at 7:30 p.m., when I’ll be a guest on Brandon Wetherbee‘s live talk show, You, Me, Them, Everybody.
Bonus link (because three in the above sentence isn’t enough): Happy Vladentine’s Day!
Need more proof of my nonstop elegance? I’m the daintiest applauser in this week’s WWE Monday Night Raw, broadcast on national television. As Damien Sandow would say (Google him, he’s my favorite), you’re welcome. #notembarrased
And it is awesome. At least it’s awesomely cathartic. For me. But for everyone else, especially future brides who don’t want to look and feel like overgrown tooth fairies on your wedding day? The Anti Wedding is dedicated to all our struggles.
Why? BECAUSE YOU GET TO LEGALLY ROB PEOPLE.
But before we get into this righteous rant, I guess I probably have some ‘splainin to do. Unless you think I’m just learning about the ins and outs of the Wedding Industrial Complex for sh*ts (I love beans) and giggles (and bean memes), you’ve probably figured out I’m also making an announcement. Yes, this bitch is getting hitched. And no, I’m not pointing at some other bitch as I type “this bitch”; by “this bitch,” I mean me. For those of you who only know me via this blog or my last one this probably seems a bit out-of-the-blue. You probably thought I’d more likely end my 2012 playing dice in a Greek gutter rather than get engaged, but ya know, turns out I’m more boring/normal that you probably thought. Plus, we’re saving Greek gutter dice for the honeymoon.
But enough about how romantic I am and back to this Wedding Industrial Complex, this sector of the economy that sucks money from your wallet faster than a goddamn Dyson. Turns out, we all have four-year-old girls to blame for that, or more accurately, four-year-old girls who grow into adult women with the imagination capacity of four-year-old girls, at least according to this article. For the record, unless you’re Kate Middleton, you will never be a pretty, pretty princess. Instead, you’ll just look like you made Halloween your wedding theme…
The sad thing is, I’m learning firsthand that that’s what the wedding industry more or less depends on. The dreams of unimaginative adults. It’s all about unrealistic fantasy. That’s why an otherwise rational person will pay $2,000 (or more) for a cake. A FUCKING CAKE. Or why someone would pay probably upwards of $10,000 to put these in the middle of perfectly innocent, otherwise very functional tables. Poor tables…
(Also, isn’t that kind of a big “fuck you” to your guests? Like, don’t you care that, I dunno, they’re able to see something more than the giant alien rose trees you stuck directly in their lines of sight?)
But I digress… As my fiance, who, by the way, is not my cat, but an actual human man (I know you were wondering), and I try to put together a grown-up soiree featuring exactly none of the above, we’ve learned that keeping things simple, adult and on budget is harder than you might think. Like, have you ever been to a bridal shop (even one that might be considered high end, hello Kleinfeld!)? They’re mostly awful. No matter the price point, they all seem to cater to the same childish taste. Big, poofy, lots of taffeta, crystals, sequins, ruffles. You just paid thousands of dollars for your cake, do you really want to look like one too?
Maybe it’s because I never thought about planning a wedding before, but I came into this brave new world of white, porcelain dinnerware, thousand-dollar cakes and holy-shit-there-are-how-many-different-kinds-of-paper knowing as much about it as my cat knows about nuclear physics. I’m just saying, had I read that the average DC wedding costs around $30,000 before we started telling people we were gonna have a wedding, I would’ve pressed the idea of elopement a little more. Imagine the kind of exotic elopement one could have for thirty grand…
But alas, here I am. If nothing else, at least I’ll be a helpful fountain of glitter-spewing knowledge by the end of this. Just pay me $10,000 and I can make all your awful dreams come true.
P.S. Fair warning: prepare yourself for what I’m sure will be some more annoying/possibly obnoxious blog posts about wedding planning coming up. You might want to un-bookmark me now. 🙂
If you’ve read this blog (or my other, now-retired blog) closely enough, you may have picked up on a little problem I have—OCD. And no, that doesn’t stand for Optimum Cash Dollars. Unlike Mr. Smalls, mo’ money would most definitely not create mo’ problems for me. Unfortunately, the OCD I’m referring to is Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, and not the hilarious and sometimes helpful kind where I have to count light switches or keep my belongings spic and span. My apartment is a mess. And now that I have a cat, it’s most likely covered in poop particles. Side note: Whoever said cats are cleaner than dogs has obviously never smelled a litter box. But I digress. My brand of OCD provides me with 24 hours of fear of death from a horrible disease seven days a week. Example? ‘Member when I was freaking out about my thyroid and the possibility of having rickets…in the 21st century? Then, of course, there was that one time I thought I had brain cancer. I didn’t write about that one because $3,000 in MRI bills isn’t very funny. On the bright side, at least I ended up with this sweet pic of my interior design:
Anyway, the point of all this ‘splainin isn’t just to come out as someone who suffers from a mental illness because I’m pretty sure everybody has something going on. I’m not that exciting. That said, feel free to probe me—NOT IN THAT WAY!—should you have questions about OCD, unless your advice or query is about whether I’ve sought professional help. I have and it helped me tremendously.
So what’s the point then?
*A reader raises his hand*
Yes, you there in the back?
“Is it to demonstrate how not to begin an essay…?”
F*ck you. No. The point is to wish myself a Happy Belated Birthday (it was July 29), or rather a Happy Still-Not-Dead Day. Despite all the germs, viruses and bacteria that are out there just waiting to kill me, I’m still around and, boy, do I have big plans for my 33rd year of life. Besides continuing to not die (always goal No. 1!), I’m vowing right now to revisit or start anew that novel I began writing in 2009. I’m also going to paint more with the aim of showing in a gallery, where I’ll sell my work for OCD. Now I am talking about Optimum Cash Dollars. Thirdly, I promise to get over my stage fright and perform at a SpeakeasyDC or other storytelling event. Fourthly, I’m going to read a lot more books. Hell, if I think I’m ready to write one, I damn well better study the craft. And finally, I promise to write more essays like this. Except better. I miss blogging. Maybe Definitely because of the instant gratification it provided (HINT: COMMENTS WELCOMED AND ENCOURAGED!), but also because it kept my (tumor free!) mind sharp. Like a dull pencil. It might not be able to cut anything, but it sure can stab the sh*t out of something soft. I don’t know what that metaphor is supposed to mean. Gimme time…
Marissa Payne 
