Baby Strippers

On the books in RI: anyone who's old enough to work and old enough to have a job, and old enough to consent to, you know, is old enough to strip. That means that you only have to be 16 to work in a strip club in RI. PS, in case you forgot, "indoor" prostitution is also legal in RI. Sin City my ass, welcome to RI. Right? Bill O'Reilly is doing a piece on this right now. The only law relating to this is that under-18's have to be home by 11:30 on a school night. I hate Bill O'Reilly, and like he does with everything else and his two blonde girlfriends, he's blowing this WAY out of proportion

I mean, this is a joke - the illegal prostitution thing is legit: for real, you can whore it up indoors all you want, you just can't sell it on the street - but the rest of this, about "children" working as strippers, this generally doesn't happen and it's truly the loophole in the law. These laws, in this very combination, have been on the books for AGES, and yes, the combination of them all in a given set of circumstances works out to make it technically legal for a 16 year old to work as a stripper, but no employer in her right mind would put a 16 year old girl to work as a stripper. This is one case that took years to come up. It's not as though there are scads of 16 year olds stripping all over the great state of RI. 1) We're a wicked small state, there are very few strip clubs; 2) I've been to half of them; 3) Bill O'Reilly is a D-Bag; 4) the VAST majority of girls working there are clearly much older than 20. Much older; 5) This is the exception to the rule, I promise; 6) Bill O'Reilly is a D-Bag.

I truly hope that this doesn't turn into a thing, because it's foolish that Billy O made an issue of it in the first place, and I hate that I justified him by writing this. Boo.

Fla ored martinis are not actual martinis. discuss.

Student Loans (sigh)

I just looked at one of my student loan statements. They show up here every month, but I rarely ever actually look at them. But I somewhat remember signing up for some kind of "graduated payments," that would supposedly increase as my earning potential increased. Hmmm. So every now and then I like to take a look and see if the payments have gone up. I see that the money comes out of my checking account every month too, don't get me wrong, but I just never notice exactly how much it is, and since I don't know how much it's going to "graduate" by, I sometimes get concerned.

Well, how excited was I today when I looked at that statement and realized that 2 of the 4 loans that are consolidated into that account now have balances that are actually LOWER than the ORIGINAL LOAN AMOUNT! I realize that this shouldn't be so exciting, but interest builds on these accounts at almost more than I'm actually paying every month! How sad is it that it's so exciting for me to see that the balance has actually dropped below the original loan amount? It only took 4 effing years to get there!! And even then, it's seriously only by about $60.

AND, I realized that I just turned 30. I've been alive for 30 years. Coincidentally, the term of my student loan repayment is 30 YEARS. Do you know how loooooooooong that feels right about now?! Ugh.

FYI

It's one of those Friday nights . . .

I love mobile blogging. The random posts that have no titles and consist of about a text message worth of discussion are all mobile posts (please notice the post time of some of them . . .). Ideally, they're meant to be place holders; the plan is that I'm going to go back and write whole posts on those topics, but I'm beginning to wonder whether that will ever happen. Hence this post explaining the random Chinese food fortune posts or "discuss" posts. I'm getting there. In the mean time, please discuss amongst yourselves.

Rhode Island is neither a road nor an island . . .

The Nate Mott Band

Now playing: The Nate Mott Band - Would You Stop Falling

Add to the short list of regrets in my life the fact that in the two years that I've know Evan, I've never previously gotten into his band. Evan interned for me in the summer of 2007, after his first year of law school and again in the spring of 2009, to complete his community service requirement for graduation. He's the best intern I personally have had in the few years that I've been an attorney, and I know that he will be a fabulous lawyer (good luck on your bar exams this summer, Evan!).

That's not the point of this post. Evan plays bass for The Nate Mott band. I recently came across their website and MySpace page and discovered that they have a couple of albums available on iTunes. They're fabulous. They're sort of Sublime-ish, I guess - mellow, but funky. Lyrically, they remind me a little of Jason Mraz (enough, I know I have an issue, but really . . .) - just in the wit and creativity of the lyrics. They're catchy, and you will love them. Their music makes me want to shake my ass, and that is key to my acknowledgement of a good band. Do yourself a favor and check them out.
Now playing: The Nate Mott Band - Laugh Out Loud

It Might Kill Me

Now playing: Jason Mraz - If It Kills Me (From the Casa Nova Sessions) [Bonus Track]

I have a new favorite song of the week: Jason Mraz (surprise, surprise, it's all I listen to lately), If It Kills Me. Holy crap. Have you ever had the experience where you've heard a song a whole bunch of times, but then this one time when you hear it, you really hear it? We Sing. We Dance. We Steal Things. has these bonus tracks that are all live and/or acoustic. One of them is If It Kills Me (From the Casa Nova Sessions), and it's so perfect, it hurts. I'm not kidding - the regular studio version of this song is fucking beautiful, but this other version is un-fucking-believable. Here's the lyrics:

Hello.
Tell me you know now.
Yeah, you figured me out.
Something - gave it away
And it would be such a beautiful moment
To see the look on your face
To know that
Know that you know now
And baby that's a case of my wishful thinking
You know nothing
Cause you and I
Why, we go carrying on
For hours on and
And we get along much better
Than you and your boyfriend
Well, all I really want to do is to love you
A kind much closer than friends use
But I still can't say it after all we've been through
And all I really want from you is to feel me
As the feeling inside keeps building
And I will find a way to you if it kills me
If it kills me
Well, how long
Can I go on like this
Wishing to kiss you
Before I rightly explode
And this double life I lead
Isn't healthy for me
In fact it makes me nervous
If I get caught, I could be risking it all
Baby, there's a lot that I'll miss
In case I'm wrong
And all I really want to do is to love you
A kind much closer than friends use
But I still can't say it after all we've been through
And all I really want from you is to feel me
As the feeling inside keeps building
And I will find a way to you if it kills me
If it kills me
If I should be so bold
I'd ask you to hold my heart in your hand
Tell you from the start how I've longed to be your man
But I never said a word
I guess I'm gonna miss my chance again
Well all I really want to do is love you
a kind much closer than friends use
But I still can't say it after all we've been through
and all I really want from you is to feel me
As this feeling inside keeps building
And I will find a way to you if it kills me
If it kills me
If it kills me
I think it might kill me
And all I really want from you is to feel me
As this feeling inside keeps building
And I will find a way to you if it kills me
If it kills me
If it kills me
It might kill me.

Right? This song makes my heart hurt. It never used to, but the other day it was like all of a sudden I could hear the pleading in his voice in the acoustic version, and it hurt. It hurt just like it did the first time. This song completely brings to mind that new, unsure love feeling from high school and college - when you're so into someone, but you're just not sure if they're into you; if you're really just friends or if maybe there's something more there. Remember that feeling? Wasn't it wonderful? That's why I read young adult books, right there. God, that was a beautiful feeling. If It Kills Me portrays that feeling perfectly. Now I can't stop listening to it, and I almost want to cry every time I hear it. Again, the studio version is so, so beautiful, but it's the bonus track acoustic version that really hits me. Wow. Keep it up J; see you July 31.

PS - while we're talking about Jason Mraz - Butterfly is a hot song.

Now playing: Jason Mraz - Butterfly (From the Casa Nova Sessions) [Bonus Track]

Puppy Love

So, this is a little delayed, but we got a dog last week! He's a smooth fox terrier, and his name is Murphy McLovin.

He's very sweet and very friendly and very, very hyper. But we love him for it.


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Now playing: Styles of Beyond - Be Your Dog