My second gig with the rock band I’m in was at a house party for Halloween. I had a stellar costume. Got a hot pink ball gown, shredded the life out of it, borrowed a tiara from our guitarist’s girlfriend (who was not only Miss Morgan Hill but was first runner up for Miss California, losing to Vanessa Williams), made a satin sash that said “Prom 1989” (the year I graduated high school), then made up my face with gray make-up and stuck a bullet hole in the middle of my forehead. Viola, Dead Prom Queen!

Everyone at the party asked how I died. Thus, this song was born:

Dead Prom Queen

Took some pictures with your mom
the night of Senior Prom
You wore a blue-ruffled shirt
I drank coffee to remain alert

We drove to our dinner
at the steakhouse-du-jour
I’ll remember this the rest of my life, fer shure.

When we got to the dance
it was already full swing
and we filled out our ballots for Prom Queen and King

The lighting dimmed down
and a hush filled the crowd
And I crossed my fingers that my name would be called…

AND IT WAS!!!

But Buffy Jenkins glared at me
And when I sat upon my throne
she vowed that soon I’d be overthrown

Challenged me to a duel
20 paces in the parking lot
We loaded our sawed-off shotguns with buckshot.

20 paces later we both turned and fired
My shot missed her but she got me
right between my eyes

And now I’m just a dead prom queen
Dead prom queen
Won’t need to be home by 2 a.m. now,
’cause now I’m a dead prom queen.

Saturday night (October 12, 1996) I lived my dream. I became a rock star.

My buddies from Adobe started a band called the Monstertones many years ago, and since the first time I saw them perform I knew I had to be a part of the band.

At a party last November I was standing near Craig (the lead singer) during a band break when an Alanis song came on the radio. I knew this was my chance so I sang it to him.

Eight months later I got an e-mail from Craig. “Wanna sing at a party?” I danced a jig behind my desk before responding with an all-caps “WOO HOO!”

After learning 21 songs in three weeks I felt fairly prepared for the gig. It was Al’s (the drummer) birthday so we were performing at his place. I showed up early for a barbeque beforehand, and then went into his bathroom to transform myself from an average jeans-and-a-T-shirt gal to rock star in a short, tight, polyester, simulated-snakeskin-pattern dress.

The transformation was thorough and amazing.

Before transformation (BT), I was flirted with by two people and had spoken to eight others. I’d been asked to provide “the female opinion” of Mike Cooper’s cologne (Cool Water, clean yet sweet, very nice). After Transformation (AT), those who hadn’t spoken to me BT did, who hadn’t flirted with me BT did, and who had flirted with me BT flaunted themselves shamelessly around me (well, maybe not shamelessly, but M.C. did come up to me during the guitar jam of an Eagles song to put his arm around my waist, inhale the scent of my perfume (Sun Moon Stars) from the nape of my neck and then kissed me below my ear. I pushed him away with an exclamation of “Hey, I’m working here!”).

People perceive and act differently toward you when you’re fronting a band as the girl singer. It was astonishing. Even when the band messed up (Craig’s motto is “we’re not getting paid for this, so let’s have fun” and Al’s is “perfection sucks”) the party members cheered.

I’d only invited three people to my debut, and during the first break I searched for them. I found my buddy John first. He greeted me with a “Wow, where have you been?”

Once I was done (having sung songs that I both knew and didn’t know…) and the guys were well into their Van Halen set I toddled around the party and ended up sitting on a bench in the food room. The 19-year-old at the party sat next to me and then asked if he could close the door. “Don’t worry,” he said. No big deal.

But then I wanted to check my pager so I went into Al’s room. James from Boston was crashed out on the bed and Vince scooted over so I could sit down. I took off my shoes and he gave me a foot rub. Ahhhh, heaven.

Later, Todd (one of the guys who spoke to me BT) and I danced the swing and he ran me through some rigorous paces. I was thankful for the year of social dance I’d taken to fulfill my Phys. Ed. requirement at San Jose State. I mostly managed to follow.

We sat down and he told me how even BT he’d felt drawn to me. He was going to be in town for a couple more days and he invited me to join group in Santa Cruz/Capitola the next day but I begged off. I gave him my number and he said he’d call*.

He walked me to my car and kissed me a few times but on the first kiss he came at me with his tongue which really turned me off so I left him with a cheery “Call me,” knowing he wouldn’t but not minding that much.

Got home at 2:45 a.m. and after a shower and sleep made it to 10:30 church a bit early. The 70-year-old usher caught me yawning as I entered the sanctuary.

“You ought not to stay up so late Saturdays,” he admonished me with a twinkle in his eye.

I stepped in, conspiratorially.

“Do you know what I did last night?” I asked him. “I sang in a rock band.”

His face lit up. “I love that rock’n’roll music,” he said, imitating Chubby Checker in the aisle.

Me too, brother. Me, too.

*He didn’t, but I hadn’t expected him to.

Many people are often surprised when they learn I am a churchgoer. Actually, it isn’t that surprising.

When I was in high school I was very active in the youth group for Lafayette-Orinda Presbyterian Church. I had a terrific youth pastor my last year at LOPC. His name was Tim.

My last semester of senior year was pretty rough. My parents announced their impending divorce and a week after that I got mono.

Yup. It pretty much sucked. But Tim was great. He visited me when I was ill and it really helped to know that he was looking out for me. He was a good friend, as a pastor should be.

I tried to stay in touch with him after I left for college, but shortly thereafter he left LOPC and I didn’t know where he’d gone.

Meanwhile, I searched for a church home in San Jose, but to no avail. None of the congregations were what I was looking for. So I shelved that idea and put God on the back burner.

Until autumn, 1996.

My boyfriend was moving to Seattle on a Sunday morning, and I figured that afterwards I’d need some spiritual support. After seeing him off, I went to Trinity Presbyterian Church, which was just down the street and around the corner from my San Carlos (CA) apartment.

I took a program and seated myself towards the back of the sanctuary. I opened the program to find out who would be giving the sermon.

Imagine my astonishment when it read: Tim Mooney, Associate Interim Pastor.

I joined with the subsequent Newcomer’s class. Now I’m also a youth group adviser for the junior high group.

Anne Lamott says that coincidences are just God working anonymously. I’m inclined to agree.

For two seasons now, I’ve been a runner with the Sun Microsystems corporate track team. I’m the youngest person on the team and all my team members blow doors off of me. They’re all at least 30, look 10 years younger than that and most have quadriceps no mere mortal should own.

Our first meet was two weekends ago. Our February weather had been surprisingly mild, at least until the Saturday of the race. When I woke up that morning I saw blue sky, which was encouraging. Unfortunately, by the time I got to the Saratoga High School track the clouds overhead threatened to pour forth great sheets of rain on our Nike-capped heads.

“Certainly the rain will wait until my first race is over,” I thought.

My boyfriend arrived shortly before my race and watched me stretch and run to the women’s restroom about 40 times. My race was called, and as the first runner for the team I took my space in lane 3. The minute I got into position it started to rain. Torrentially.

People who don’t wear glasses don’t realize what a hassle it is to be outside when it’s raining. The spots get on your lenses and makes it virtually impossible to see. It’s also difficult to do anything about it when you’re booking around the track in an attempt to finish your 440 leg before your glasses completely fog over, clouding your vision to the point that you can barely see the teammate to whom you’re to pass the baton (without dropping it, thank you very much).

To make matters worse, three of our four runners for that relay wore glasses. Despite that obstacle, we placed fourth in the race.

After excusing my boyfriend from the rainy spectacle, I sought refuge with my teammates in the equipment shed. One guy had a weather thermometer on his watch, and we took perverse glee in watching the register fall from 55 degrees to 43 degrees within a half-hour period.

You Minnesotans are probably laughing your a**es off at the above statement, but I’m a California girl and 43 degrees is COLD!

Our coach came by the shed. “Larry,” we pleaded, “tell Brian to call the meet!”

He grinned. “The only way that Brian is going to call this meet is if hailstones start coming down and knocking racers unconscious.”

The hail began 10 minutes later, but since it was only the size of lima beans the meet continued.

It actually warmed up in time for the women’s relay, my second and final race of the day. I was the first runner again and my 440 lap felt much better than the first one had (considering I’d just gotten over bronchitis two weeks before, I was pleased that I could run at all!). The other women in my team kicked butt and we came in third for that race!

Sun took fourth place in the meet overall, and we celebrated with pizza and beer in a nice, warm pizzeria. Runners are great fun to party with!

My man Lamar [Alexander] is officially over and done. Sigh. Fortunately, Pat Buchanan, professional hate-monger, is out of it too, so that takes a bit of the sting out of not-so-super Tuesday.

I’ve been feeling rather dead lately. I gave notice at my job last Friday, and my coworkers have been talking to me about how much they’ll miss me. The going-away party is next Wednesday and will be absolutely no-holds-barred. I think it will be a Wake.

I am starting my new job on March 25, so I’ll have some spare time in the interim. I’m accompanying my boyfriend to Las Vegas for three days, so I’ll get to lounge by the pool at Bally’s while he’s learning about automatic transmissions. I think I’m getting the better part of the deal. 🙂

So how have I been spending my last days at my place of employment? Well, I gave a seminar about business opportunities on the WWW last night. I bought the refreshments as well. Oh, and I’ve been catching up on my newsgroups — so much happens on misc.kids.pregnancy and ba.internet that it’s hard not to read them at least 15 times a day.

I exercise often, and like to read as I do (helps take the mind off the pain). Lately, my literary companions have been various Internet magazines because I want to show the men with bulging muscles and tight tank tops just what a geek I am.

Anyway, I was on the recumbant bike this evening with a free copy of Internet World, a MecklerMedia publication that I’d scammed from their ad rep at COMDEX. The previous magazine I’d gone through was Internet Underground, which blows doors off of Wired.

The same did not hold for Internet World (IW as it is now and ever shall be), so after the industry news section in the front I turned my attention to the advertising.

I wish I hadn’t.

Long-standing Internet users be warned: According to Internet companies that advertise, your future infobahn carpoolers are sex-crazed.

The first ad that caught my eye was full page and printed on heavier cardstock. The advertiser was Prodigy, which I remember seeing when I was in fourth grade. A woman who wasn’t even born when I was in fourth grade is featured, wearing a denim jacket, tight jeans and a come-access-me-now pout. She is leaned over a purple convertible sportscar.

The copy is a quote set in 40 pt. Helvetica:

“Let’s just say I don’t hang out in the Knitting Forum.”

Below this, a burst tells us that “‘Loni’ got into Prodigy Pseudo Chat on Wednesday, 9:37 P.M. ”

(Men: Do you really think that women named “Loni” even exist? If so, I have a green card to sell you.)

It seems that this sexual advertising is getting worse before getting better. Other ads I’ve seen (in sources other than IW) have included a woman, backside to the camera in a Melissa Etheridge-bluejeans-and-nothing-else pose with two floppy disks in each back pocket. Another often-used image is “attractive woman as guide to the Internet” (which will be further discussed in part three: Coddling).

I know that there’s sex on the Internet. When I was in tech support, customers would ask me to add erotica newsgroups to our USENET feed. Some of the titles were hair-curlingly repulsive.

But do we really need to sell the Internet as sexy? Should the person who would be lured by Loni’s testimonial really be allowed to partake in the forum? Do they have anything to offer other than net.harrassment and “me too”‘s?

While I find all attempts of net.censorship reprehensible, and would happily give Senator Exon a blow to the head (though judging from his soundbites someone already has), I am concerned that online services or any service provider are resorting first to what should be the final resort!

If people aren’t turned on to information, they won’t offer much to the Internet community other than their own gratification. And I’m not interested in reading anything typed with only one hand.

I’m getting *really* tired of this United Nations vs. the Serbs battle. They’re threating air strikes against the Serbs again, which is striking fear into the hearts of those UN peacekeepers (who, in their baby-blue helmets, look barely adequate to stage an effective pillow fight, let alone ensure peace to the long- suffering muslims…). B. B-Ghali and his Gorazde band need to come up with something a little more threatening than “OK, Serbs, you better cut it out. We’re getting really really miffed and just might actually finally do something about it.”

The thing that amazes me about the minority Serb forces is that they’ve managed to gain control of 30 percent of Croatia and 70 percent of Bosnia, while armed with nothing but Yugoslav weapons. Their guns are certainly more reliable than their Yugos were! Too bad it isn’t the other way around…

BONEHEAD OF THE MONTH: Judge Albert Mestemaker, of the Hamilton County (Ohio) Municipal Court. After convicting Scott Hancock of punching his live-in girlfriend in the mouth, Mestemaker sentenced Hancock to marry the woman.

“I believe strongly in family values,” Mestemaker said after sentencing.

He believes that domestic violence is less likely to occur between married people than between unmarried people living together.

I guess Mestemaker didn’t read the news brief about Dale McDowell from the same issue of the Merc: 24 hours after his release from prison (where he was serving time on domestic violence charges), McDowell was arrested when police found his wife’s murdered body in the trunk of the car he drove to pick up his son from day care.

So, what did I do after reading July 15th’s paper? I went to church… to be a bridesmaid for a girlfriend of mine.

Swell…

attended: June 21, 1995

I am standing outside the Tech Museum in downtown San Jose, which smells worse than I remember from my not-so-long-ago SJSU days. There are about 15 of us milling around, including my buddy Jim, who proposed we check out this event of nerddom at its finest.

The doors will open at 6:00 and we will be ushered in to the main room of the museum to wait for Douglas Coupland, author of _Generation X_ and the new _Microserfs_.

Now, I tried to read _Gen X_ last year at the suggestion of a buddy I worked with at Adobe Systems. “Lynn, you’ll love it!” he insisted.

I got to page 56. It was too true to life and it was just too painful. The part that really got me was when gray-fabric-covered cubicles were described as “veal-fattening pens.” Ouch.

So, anyway, about 10 minutes before 6:00, a museum official comes outside and hands everybody a clean-room bunny suit, which we (like sheep) proceed to slip into. Within minutes we resembled a Michelin Man reunion.

This would definitely _not_ be a normal evening.

Once we got inside (after paying our $6 admission fee), we were handed moist towelettes emblazoned with “microserfs”. The towelettes proclaimed that they were ideal for removing nasal encrustations from computer monitors. This being allergy season, I appreciated the gift.

We were also offered latex gloves. I put mine on with a “snap” and turned to Jim.

“Heheheh, Mike and I are going to have some fun tonight!”

Jim sympathized with my absent boyfriend.

We got some wine from the open bar and snagged seats in the second row. A TV screen blared images of commercials I remembered from when I was 4 years old.

Two guys were already there, sitting in the middle of the row. They hijacked my (well, Jim’s, actually) notebook and proceeded to describe the scene, inferring that I was on my fifth glass of blush wine. Like I would really ever stoop to drink *blush* wine.

One of them (an Apple employee) described the Devo image currently playing, which involved Tokyo City 1988 and cross-eyed Asian women.

Jim and I wandered a bit more, until we found ourselves face-to-face with the Doug-man himself. A reporter to his left looked annoyed when one of the “party guests” starts discussing the merits of older Lego sets with Douglas. Jim piped up that things just weren’t the same after Lego came out with the people with painted faces. Doug concurred. I told him about my feelings about veal-fattening pens. He seemed pleased.

Douglas Coupland is *very* mild-mannered, to the point of almost being creepy. He stood out against the sea of white (remember, we were all in clean suits — some guy even brought his own!) in a staid grey suit which buttoned to his chest.

His talk began at 7:20, and he read three “ultra-shorts” to us. The first one was called “The Whole World and One Entire Life Inside of One Day,” and it blew my mind. He wrote it in the Bahamas, and the premise revolved around how he would be judged if his entire life were judged by this one day he’d spent there. He described his encounters with an ocean “charged with angelfish,” and with a woman who looked at the stars every night because her son was in America at college and “the only common ground they had was the sky.” The best part of the story, though, was when he started addressing a lover as “you,” because “we all have a ‘you’ in our life.”

The ultra-short resolved with his decision that “the sun will not be judged for falling, as I will judge myself,” and just for a moment I wished that I could climb inside his head and share his thought process.

The second ultra-short, “Power Failure,” dealt with “pre-television notions of ‘identity’.” The third was in the genre of an Itchy and Scratchy cartoon, which led into his movie (the reason we were all gathered together in clean suits).

The 25 minute film, The Last Laugh, was “the result of lots of ideas and not very much money.” Broken up into three parts, the first was Part One: Mind. After asking us to please spread the rumor that in Pulp Fiction, Glenn Close played The Gimp, the film began.

Part One: Mind dealt with the identity/life crisis brought upon us by Television (it seems appropriate to capitalize that). “Not having a life is so common, it’s become the norm.” Television is “information crack,” which gets us hooked and makes us crave even more of it. Doug believes that the dominant activities 20 years from now will be “going shopping and going to jail.” He’s a bit pessimistic, perhaps…

Part Two: Body discussed the mind/body relationship: People have become their own focus group (Jim nudged me at that. “Write that one down”). Douglas had his body composition measured a while ago and the caliper-bearer looked at him in horror. “You’re a thin fat person!”

“I’m skinny, and what I have isn’t even meat,” he complained.

The cannibals in the room left in disgust.

Part K (sound it out): Soul got even more philosophical. Bulk memory has erased history as bulk shopping has erased regular shopping. The future lies on the other side of that cartoon hole in the ground. Because of technology, we’re no longer condemned to repeat a cycle of mistakes.

“It takes a lot of work to be an individual.”

After the film, Jim and I joined the line to get autographs. He’d brought three copies of _microserfs_ for Douglas to sign. I prepared a clean steno sheet and the folded clean suit I snagged from a box at the entrance. While waiting, three nerds behind us discussed the realtive goodness of Great America. They concurred that Days of Thunder sucks. Don’t waste your time. They also bemoaned the fact that the Whizzer is gone (“just because some people died on it…”) and has been reassembled in Japan.

After half an hour, Jim reached His Couplandness and got his three copies signed. Someone cut in front of me to say goodbye to Douglas, which I allowed (must have been the wine…).

When I finally reached him, I handed him my steno pad with the clean sheet of paper. He withdrew a rubber stamp with red ink, and stamped:

To my close personal friend:

Date:

Location:

…then filled in the blanks and scrawled a big “Doug” below. After that was done, I withdrew the folded clean suit and asked him to sign it to “You, because I was really moved by that line in your first ultra-short, about how everybody has a ‘you’ in their life.”

He signed as I was speaking, but when I finished my sentence he paused for a moment, as though surprised that I (or anyone) had derived meaning from that statement. As I turned to leave, I heard him whisper, “Wow.”

He’d signed it to “You!”

As I left, my allergies started up again. I grabbed some emergency towelettes and left the building.

(Some might find this a bit self-centered. Considering that in my job I listen to 60 people talk about their problems every day, I think I’m entitled… 🙂

# First things first: When were you born?

November 23rd. When I was born, my parents brought me home from the hospital on Thanksgiving day.

# What year?

Let’s put it this way: I went straight to college after high school, graduated in 4 1/2 years and have been out in the workforce since March of ’94.

# Close enough. Read anything good lately?

Yes, most recently The Three Musketeers. Prior to that, Microserfs by Douglas Coupland, and while on vacation I read Geek Love by Katherine Dunn.

# Quite a selection. What’s your favorite genre?

EDITED, sorry!

# Do you keep a journal?

Back then I did — there are six volumes from high school in my nightstand.

# And now?

I don’t know — I try to, but always manage to get caught up in other things.

# Did you make a 1995 New Year’s resolution?

Yes: to be kind.

# How’s it coming along?

Pretty well. Somtimes its more challenging than others…

# What’s the most luxurious thing you own?

A monogrammed satin pillowcase.

# Monogrammed with what?

My initials: MEB

# Why do you go by Motormouth?

Because nobody spells my real name correctly.

# Come on…

No, I’m serious. When I was growing up, the high point of Easter was seeing how Nana had butchered my name that year.

# What was the worst?

The year I got the chocolate egg with “Marylin” scripted across the top.

# What do you consider your greatest accomplishment?

Doing my laundry and putting it away tonight. Accomplishments don’t count once they’re two hours old.

# Your biggest regret is…

Naming my cat “OJ”. It actually stands for Odysseus Joseph, but try explaining that in these times…

# Did you have pets as a child?

Yes, three Shetland sheepdogs and various carnival-trophy goldfish.

# Those goldfish will teach a kid about mortality real quick.

I remember getting ready for bed one night and noticing that Oscar wasn’t in his bowl. Mom and I looked and looked, but he was nowhere to be found. Two months later, I noticed him on the floor at the foot of my bed, staring up at me with his big blue eye.

# Gruesome!

You’re telling me. I’ll never forget it.

# Lynn, thanks for your time. Let’s close with your personal philosophy.

“Everything in moderation,” with the occasional exception of exercise and booze.

[This was published in the Spartan Daily, campus newspaper for San Jose State University, but it raised a lot of comments so I posted it when I started my blog in 1995. –MM/LBJ]

got me invited to radio shows and into classrooms as a guest speaker

Why am I not a feminist? Because…

Feminism: (n) The movement to win political, economic and social equality for women…

As a fed-up, independent, minority-opinionated republican, I feel it is my duty to inform you that Mr. Webster forgot to add the logical end of that definition: “…by stepping on, cursing out or ignoring anyone who offers a differing viewpoint.”

If I didn’t see them as a dangerous threat to society, feminists and their dogmatic ideals would amuse the heck out of me. Any group of professional whiners and self-declared martyrs is usually good for a belly laugh.

I guess I’ve seen and heard too much from their camp to do much laughing.

If feminists simply wanted equality, I’d be likely to join them. Equality is a good thing.

But when was the last time you heard a feminist say, “I want to be equal to men in salary, benefits and socioeconomic position?”

That’s right, you haven’t. Because they’re too busy plotting a future existence that will occur after they’ve castrated and killed all me on earth to create their matriarchal society.

Oh… you don’t believe me, eh? Then try this experiment: Watch “Women Aloud!” on Comedy Central some afternoon. It won’t be easy, I know, but do your best.

During the course of the show, which is hosted by Mo Gaffney (who acts as though she never got asked on a date during her formative years and uses her talk show as retribution on the entire male gender), count the number of times she and her guests demean men.

This show exhibits such a vigorous hatred that, if their comments were directed toward women, it would get kicked off the air. By feminists.

Incidentally, the last time I watched, Mo apologized for not being a lesbian. It was then that I turned off the set.

(Editor’s note: Women Aloud was cancelled shortly after this column was written. Maybe there are better times ahead.)

It amazes me that such angry, forceful women make up such ridiculous excuses for their overall lack of progress. Last year I attended a Halloween party held by my fraternity. One of the members, a rampant feminist, showed up with her hair curled and make-up on (surprising in it’s own right), wearing a prom dress that was lovely from the waist up, but the skirt was slashed to ribbons and covered in bloody handprints.

“Eve,” I asked, “what are you supposed to be.”

She looked me in the eye and responded proudly, “I’m the objectification of women.”

Cool. She obviously didn’t go to my prom…

It also amazes me that feminists believe that they’re so open-minded. Easy way to disprove them on this count: Get a whole bunch of them in a room and say “Camille Paglia.”

I learned this at a friend’s graduation brunch at UCSC. Her roommate had just written a thesis on feminist thought (misnomer, anyone?) and Karen handed it to me. “Here, you’re a feminist. Read this.”

I took it, but clarified, “Actually, I’m more from the Camille Paglia school of thought.”

Karen’s eyes bulged. “I wouldn’t say that too loudly around here if I were you,” she whispered.

I stuffed my mouth with spinach dip to force myself to not respond.

Examples aside, the real reason I refuse to toss my hat into the feminist ring is that I love men. Love ’em. Not because every man I’ve ever met has been charming to me — in fact, my track record is pretty pathetic.

Despite that, I’ve found that men are a lot more fair and a lot less backbiting than the so-called “fairer sex.” And I think that, deep down, feminists must feel the same way.

How else can you explain why, although they despise everything male-related, they are working so hard to become men?