More often than not, I get a good night’s sleep. This is remarkable considering my middle-aged lady hormonal weirdness, the mishigas in my life, and my history of secondary insomnia.
My sleep has been so luxuriously dreamy and reliable enough that I have not refilled my prescription to Klonopin, the Mother’s Little Helper that got me through a custody battle, demise of my second marriage, and yet another move.
Perhaps most remarkable is my ability to sleep through the nails-on-chalkboard noises of the barbarians next door. The 20something party boys who sit on their filthy, butt-laden, barbell-littered patio, smoking cigars, chugging Yellow Tail, and mindlessly entertaining various skanks. Every night I lie in bed inhaling the fumes of their cheap cigars, my blood boiling as the cacophany below ratchets ever louder.
One night, at 1:00 a.m., I pushed my blinds apart, ready to yell at the heathens to shut the (insert expletive) up. Until one of them glanced up at me, grinned and waved, then returned to his sophomoric anecdote which spurred a chorus of giggles from the skanks. Realizing I was the captive of passive-aggressiveness, I sighed and closed the blinds.
So I have learned to live with the noise. I crank up the volume on NetFlix (lately I’ve been on a Breaking Bad binge), sink back on my cloud of pillows, and let sleep, one of life’s simplest yet greatest pleasures, overtake me.
Today, I’m thankful for a good night’s sleep.
While I look forward to a good night’s sleep once I have progressed out of the state of unravel in which I currently exist, I’m thankful that my therapist is generous with her Rx pad and unquestioningly refills my Lorazapam (Vitamin L as my friend calls it) and Ambien without judgement or hesitation..
Absolutely! Wouldn’t have made it through my various storms without benzos.
Red red wine…you make me feel so fine…! Whatever it takes I say go for it.
Congrats on the good night’s sleep. But something about this blog post sat wrong with me and I’ve come back a day later to tell you why. So, the young men who disturb you are “The 20something party boys who sit on their filthy, butt-laden, barbell-littered patio, smoking cigars, (and) chugging Yellow Tail” while the women are “skanks”? Why can’t they be party girls who sit on a filthy butt-laden, etc etc. Why the special, gender-based insulting term for young women who are doing literally the same annoying things as the young men?
I’d like to think that when my teenage daughters are of an age to be partying late at night and bothering the neighbors, said neighbors will be muttering, christ, what assholes, not, go home, skanky slut hos. Equality rocks!
I in no way meant to paint a more favorable picture of the men on the patio. The point of the anecdote is that the guys are classless — not because of gender, but because of the lack of regard for their neighbors. If they were a bunch of girls with guys visiting, I would have just as low an opinion of the guys for colluding with obnoxious behavior.
You still seem to be kinda missing the point here. You added in a gratuitous slap at the women with an inappropriate sexist insult, a sexist insult totally unsupported by the behavior exhibited by the women. So again I ask, why are the young women characterized as “skanks”? You are the one differentiating between the “classless” men and the “skank” women. Why aren’t all the partying jerks just an amorphous mass of partying jerks? Why two categories of assholeness?
Do you not see that “skank” is a gender specific insult used in a situation where gender doesn’t matter?
I think you’re reading too much into my use of the word “skank.” If there were a male version of the word, I would use it for the guys. Maybe I should have called them “manks.” Anyway, my tone veers on the irreverent at times. I certainly didn’t mean to insult women, since I am one.
Congrats on the good night’s sleep. But something about this blog post sat wrong with me and I’ve come back a day later to tell you why. So, the young men who disturb you are “The 20something party boys who sit on their filthy, butt-laden, barbell-littered patio, smoking cigars, (and) chugging Yellow Tail” while the women are “skanks”? Why can’t they be party girls who sit on a filthy butt-laden, etc etc. Why the special, gender-based insulting term for young women who are doing literally the same annoying things as the young men?
I’d like to think that when my teenage daughters are of an age to be partying late at night and bothering the neighbors, said neighbors will be muttering, christ, what assholes, not, go home, skanky slut hos. Equality rocks!
I in no way meant to paint a more favorable picture of the men on the patio. The point of the anecdote is that the guys are classless — not because of gender, but because of the lack of regard for their neighbors. If they were a bunch of girls with guys visiting, I would have just as low an opinion of the guys for colluding with obnoxious behavior.
You still seem to be kinda missing the point here. You added in a gratuitous slap at the women with an inappropriate sexist insult, a sexist insult totally unsupported by the behavior exhibited by the women. So again I ask, why are the young women characterized as “skanks”? You are the one differentiating between the “classless” men and the “skank” women. Why aren’t all the partying jerks just an amorphous mass of partying jerks? Why two categories of assholeness?
Do you not see that “skank” is a gender specific insult used in a situation where gender doesn’t matter?
I think you’re reading too much into my use of the word “skank.” If there were a male version of the word, I would use it for the guys. Maybe I should have called them “manks.” Anyway, my tone veers on the irreverent at times. I certainly didn’t mean to insult women, since I am one.
OH FOR GOD’S SAKE PAULINE, THE FACT THAT THERE IS NOT A MALE VERSION OF THE WORD DEMONSTRATES THAT IT IS INHERENTLY SEXIST. Yes, I am yelling at you. Your tone was not “irreverent,” it was sexist. It’s not that you chose the wrong separate word for the women, it’s that you felt compelled to differentiate between the men and women who were annoying you. Would you have felt similarly compelled to differentiate if the obnoxious parties had involved two different ethnic groups (the boorish men and the (insert slur here)?
Irreverent – poking fun at things that are traditionally revered. See Monty Python, for example. Sexist – injecting gender where it doesn’t belong. See your blog entry singling out the women on the basis of their imputed sexual histories for behavior that is LITERALLY IDENTICAL TO THAT OF THE MEN PRESENT.
I get your point but still think you are projecting a meaning and intention to my use of a word that is not at all what I intended. I get your point, but it’s not mine. I’m just not that politically correct, nor do I have any desire to be. If you think I’m sexist, fine, I’m not going to argue with you, but I definitely don’t agree with you. I think if there’s anything to be offended by in this post, it’s my snotty attitude towards Yellow Tail.