Imitation of Life movie scan

2010 is going to be a momentous year for me on every single level. I think I’m even going to change the name of this blog, mainly because I no longer want to make Comebacks. And as I’ve said before, words are powerful. And its completely exhausting being consumed with making a comeback every moment of your waking day. Sometimes maintaining a great, joyful and prosperous life is even better. I’m no longer in love with the struggle, but that’s too heavy for yall today and its another blog for another day.

But on this gratitude Friday I got up thinking how sometimes I’ve fallen in to the bandwagon trap. Last night I was listening to a speaker online who basically stated:

“Our brains are wired to imitate others and then hide the fact that we’re doing it.”

I’ve fallen victim to this with the clothes I’ve bought, the handbags I carry, the people I like, even given the fact that I was raised to march to the beat of my own drummer, to be my own person. But the older I get (and the more I live in the DC metro area) I realize that most people, including myself sometimes, are mere drones. We get into the habit of regurgitating soundbites of why we don’t like someone, or why we can’t live somewhere else, why we we drive the cars we drive, etc.

Over time all these reasons of being and doing, become someone else’s or a culmination of groups of people. I’m fascinated at how others influence us more than we ever could imagine.

And on this gratitude Friday, I reject the B.S. I’m grateful that I see more clearly than ever that I don’t need for other people to help form my opinion of who I am, the people who I like and associate with, where I go in my free time and what I want to ultimately do with my life. I’m grateful for embracing truly independent thinking and being totally bored with the sound-biting drones.

Black Friday gets really serious when “insiders” start to leak ads. I found the Walmart leaked ad yesterday. And some of the deals are more enticing than the rumored target 10 dollar gift certificates on purchases over $100.00. But still, I’ve never participated in black Friday, mainly because there is no way on God’s green earth I’m waking up at 3 am, to find a deal. But for some reason the rumored Target and the now leaked Walmart deals sound REALLY good especially when you have quite a few people, namely kids to buy for. Kids who are now way older and more discerning. Who don’t just get down now with action figures. They’re more sophisticated, they download games and end up in chat rooms talking about which ones suck and which ones are the bomb.

They want Nintendo Wii, the Xbox 360, remote control gaming chairs and the latest video games.

Well forget about stores, when you want to download your favorite games, I didn’t even know that the most popular games can be downloaded online. The one I’ve never been able to get into, that I’ll probably check out later-when my productivity starts to lag is Sudoko. I’ve played it briefly on an air plane, but its supposed to make you smarter. And I could use a game to help that.

The I Heart Bingo T-Shirt

A few years back my mother had me going to bingo with her a couple of times at a local fire station. What’s worse is she asked me to go on a Friday. Friday is when my social life commences, but at the time I was seriously dating a jerk, so bingo sounded way more fun-than going on a date with a man I just couldn’t break up with. I can’t say I was excited to go, but when I got there I was hella surprised. For one, its not boring. And secondly, you have some serious bingo enthusiasts in the 20/30 set wearing bingo fashion pressing their ink bottles on A6 and B32.

Thirdly and to my utter surprise, bingo is fast and furious. I consider myself to be pretty da!mn smart and excitable at times, well imagine me looking confused when all of a sudden the bingo ladies decided to switch from regular bingo to roundrobbin bingo-just when I was getting into the old fashion version I grew up on. WTF??? my mother of course was totally into it. And there were some cute guys there too-I suppose spending bingo time with their momma’s too.

Comebackers, are you bingo enthusiasts? And more importantly would you wear a T-shirt to proclaim it? I hate to call out trends, but bingo my friends, yes even with your momma, is making a comeback.

I am SOO.. ready for Thanksgiving..I’m ready for some snow too..bring on the snow and my uncle’s “drunk turkey” (basted in red wine).

Dorothy Dandridge and Harry Belafonte in Carmen Jones

I truly believe that Facebook could inspire a year’s worth of posts with little duplication especially around human interaction and thought. I love provocative updates in people’s profiles, because usually when hot buttons are pressed personal truths follow. And I’m not so sanctimonious to believe that there is only one truth; sometimes there are many. What fascinates me though is how and why people ARRIVE “there”; particularly women.

Olivia Fox wrote: A co-worker and I were having a conversation and out his mouth he spewed, if a woman rolls her fist up to hit me I will hit her back. And I said are you serious? As Grown ass man, you would hit a woman? and he said if a woman comes to me trying to fight like a man I will hit her like she was a man. Needless to say he has been put on PUNK ASS status, what are your thoughts?

Domestic violence has been hashed and rehashed on the internet. The Rhi Rhi and Chris show gets aired out on every blog and news station at least 700 million times a month. What became MORE interesting about the resulting media attention and (black) blog posts isn’t just the common men going off on “know your role” tangents and “don’t provoke men with your mouth”, but women who were coming out from under rocks co-signing the foolishness. Olivia Fox as of this morning has 79 comments on her status update and curiously the comments between men and women are split pretty evenly. And true to form most of the men are providing the standard “I don’t hit women BUT {insert the provocative extreme that would make it ok}, followed by the minority of men who state “Its never ok, walk away, calmer heads prevail.”

Sadly, that’s all pretty standard and expected on black web 2.0.

What is flooring and flabbergasting me are women who are finding “valid” reasons for a man to oops up side another woman’s head. Two other random blogs written by women I read this week similarly decided to make di!ck’s law, chick’s law (and I use d!ick in its most descriptive term) examining double standards in verbal and physical abuse. I don’t think there is EVER an excuse for a man to hit a woman. And I often note that there is something seriously wrong with a conversation and a person who would provide case studies and examples when it **might** be o.k or my favorite urban legend “My second cousin Tarshameika’La’Tifa-Michelle who weighs 350 pounds beats her man who weighs 82 pounds dripping wet EVERY NIGHT-so when is it ok for him to hit back?” (the better question is when is it OK FOR HIM TO LEAVE? when is it o.k. for her to get some HELP?)

When women start to mindlessly echo male retorts on “when its ok” to verbally or physically attack another women, it reveals a lot about women who may JUST want ANY man, appealing to the sensibilities of the lowest common denominator. Particularly when discussions never explore incompatibilities or incompatibilities in the escalations or better yet growing and moving on past poor experiences and picking a person who doesn’t provoke you to the kind of anger that you could physically harm someone or go to jail over.

A chick’s chick vs. a Dyck’s chick, black web. 2.0.

Martha Stewart

No one epitomizes the art of the fu!ck up and the do over more than Martha Stewart. If you’ve been reading this blog for any amount of time, you already know I love me some her and have so for a long time, even when reading her unauthorized biography more than six years ago. It exposed all the alleged and nasty stories of Martha’s verbal assaults against her poor assistants when they accidently placed the salad fork, the dinner fork and the dessert fork in the wrong order. But after Martha emerged from jail, in a drab gray Poncho her prison bestie had made, I worried about Martha. Could she make a comeback? Would people, particularly those who needed a reason to hate her more, seal a nail in her professional coffin as the greedy inside trader-white collar criminal?

Well, the UK wasn’t very forgiving in June of last year when they denied her entry based on her prior conviction for obstructing justice. You’ll always have people who never let you live down your fu!ck up.

But Martha had something on her side; time and the public’s forgetfulness.

Even after TV, new deals with Walmart, Macy’s, wine makers and home builders-she emerged stronger and richer than before. I got to thinking about how Martha’s lesson is essentially a lesson for us all regardless of whether or not you have a strong desire to make cup cakes from scratch tonight.

I’m reminded a few years ago when I made a drastic mistake at work which brought down a whole region for a few minutes hours. My little script was totally jacked up. And I probably should have made those major changes at night and perhaps testing the script first would have saved me the pain. But NO! I was confident. How could Comeback Tiffy make a mistake? Well when the outage calls started to come in, I realized I had fyucked up BIG time. And that I’d probably not have a job once it was all over. Well I wasn’t fired; I admitted the mistake, cleaned it up and went in the bathroom and cried. And I could feel people looking at me in my little brown cube and thinking “what a stupid bioootch young lady.

And then my workplace buddy, Sally, reminded me that people… ALL people are inherently self-interested and focused. Sure many will notice your fu!ck up. They may even be thrilled to find it, but almost as soon as they’ve unearthed or discovered your mistakes, is as soon as they have moved back to someone else’s or their own.

And she was right. A day or two later, my fu!ck up was fu!ck up history. It was me who gave the mistake greater power long after most people had forgotten it.

Viva la amnesia..Comebackers

All Girl Band, Klymaxx

Its 6:05 pm Sunday night and almost two hours before TV One airs Unsung this time featuring the all girl group Klymaxx. I haven’t been able to watch a lot of tv lately, particularly Unsung, since the episode chronicling the life and career of Minnie Riperton. But Unsung is a brilliant concept; it exposes black artists (and Tina Marie) who never really got the acclaim they deserved from the Clark Sisters to Donny Hathaway to Debarge-the list is REALLY REALLY long.

But back to Klymaxx, when I wasn’t spending time in my mother’s closet and high heels trying to be Shelia E, I was pretending to be apart of this all girl band. I remember even taking my fisher price record cassette player to school swearing up and down I was going to sing “I miss you” for the talent show. As a kid, I never knew that that group’s biggest problem may have been their own internal issues and ego battles.

But I also got to thinking about other artists who never got the fame they deserved.

I can think of a several:

1. Donny Hathaway
2. Stacy Lattisaw
3. Eva Cassidy
4. Tonya Blount
5. Yahzarah
6. Lalah Hatahway
7. Choklate
8. Milira

Wow, half of my list are DC area home grown artists. But Comebackers, what artist or artists can you think of who never got the acclaim they deserved? If you don’t have TV One, call your cable station to request it. Its the smarter, more original version of B.E.T. and owned and operated by the brilliant trailblazer Cathy Hughes.

One of the most embarrassing experiences I’ve ever had with a vibrator I’ve already discussed many times in the comment section here. But I thought today I’d go into the greater detail-its taken out of a ‘Sex & The City’ Miranda episode; except my story is true and truth is often stranger than fiction.

It was almost two years ago and for some reason I was over se!x toys, at least for 2006. But I wasn’t ready to throw it away, so I put it back in its box and hid it in my garden boots. Well my merry maids found it. Why they felt the need to clean inside of a large green boot inside my very organized (at the time) closet escapes me. The boots were moved and not by an 18 and over house cleaner, but her two 16 year old kids. But it happened. I haven’t used it since.

I think getting over the stigma will most likely revolve around purchasing a new one. But I was wondering why bloggers, particularly women, don’t blog alot about vibrators any more? In fact in most of my grown women conversations with friends we almost NEVER talk about using them alone or with our significant others. Have women stopped pleasuring themselves? Is there still a stigma surrounding men who feel intimidated when you take one out in the midst of making love? Am I asking way too many questions for this post?

Skiers in High Park, Toronto, January, 1925

As the fall season transitions into winter, most people, including your favorite Comeback Girl of all the world, moi -needs time for renewal, ie, a vacation. A few days ago, I wrote about my favorite sites for deals and bargains. And when it comes to a vacation, we should all be looking for the best price. I’m planning on hitting the slopes this winter. And even I plan ahead, that’s namely how to get the best price. And during economic times like these; family vacation budgeting should be paramount in the minds of the fabulous price conscious traveler who may even be going through debt consolidation.

Some of my top tips are:

1. Airfare sales usually occur during the beginning of the week: Many people have stated that Tuesday right after midnight is the best time across all airlines to get the best fare, but I’m not always so sure this is true. You should be buying your flight ticket as far in advance as possible though.

2. When booking a hotel, ask for a lower rate: This worked for me once at a high end hotel. Not a lot of people know that all you have to do is ask. I believe hotels refer to this kind of rate as a “fallback” rate when the quoted price is met with resistance. Its not guaranteed to work, but hey It never hurts to ask. “Is that the best price?”

3. Be Flexible With Your Dates: This is self-explanatory, but be flexible. If you have a couple of months that you’d like to travel say December or January, search sites, call destinations or travel agents leaving a few months open, you are bound to find a great deal.

So I basically just off’d a big bottle of Fiji water. Hey I’m a woman of simple pleasures. I’m not a tap water kind of girl; even the bottled versions that are actually just bottled tap, including Dasani and Aquafina.

What a ramble. LOL.

Today, is gratitude Friday. And I was going to blog today about simple pleasures. But then I got to thinking that maybe Fiji water isn’t exactly simple. No matter. I’m grateful for having choices. I’m grateful for my Fiji.