A gunman walked into the Silver Spring HQ of Discovery and took hostages. This piece is about his manifesto, which is too good to pass up. Don’t take my satire and sarcasm to mean that I in ANYWAY believe that he was justified or even sane. For the mere act of pointing a gun at innocent people, and for terrorizing them he should be held down and let every person he affected kicked in the gonads and then spend some intense years in jail. I just want to say that. But since he’s dead, I think we can figure he got what he deserved.

The Discovery Channel and it’s affiliate channels MUST have daily television programs at prime time slots based on Daniel Quinn’s “My Ishmael” pages 207-212 where solutions to save the planet…A game show format contest would be in order. MAKE IT INTERESTING SO PEOPLE WATCH AND APPLY SOLUTIONS!!!!

Look, dude I’ve watched some of that TV TLC puts out on the air too. I get it makes you crazy, but, trust me, we don’t need another game show. And no amount of ammo you got is making me watch Kate plus 8.

All programs on Discovery Health-TLC must stop encouraging the birth….In those programs’ places, programs encouraging human sterilization and infertility must be pushed.

This seems a little extreme to most of you, but I get his point. I mean Heidi Montag is still fertile! What if she reproduces?! Clearly he didn’t mean the rest of us. My children are awesome.

All programs promoting War and the technology behind those must cease.

True dat. I can only watch Band of Brothers, three, four more times- tops.

Civilization must be exposed for the filth it is.

This guy is WORKING on it, watch his commercial. Give him some time to work his magic. Helllooo ladies.

Immigration: Programs must be developed to find solutions to stopping ALL immigration pollution and the anchor baby filth that follows that. Find solutions to stopping it.

The native americans have been saying this for YEARS. Holy hell, it’s about time all these white people got the hell outta here.

Find solutions for Global Warming, Automotive pollution, International Trade, factory pollution, and the whole blasted human economy.

Yeah, cause let’s move to a bear-based economy. Um….can someone tell me how that works? Do we pay each other in salmon?

Develop shows that will correct and dismantle the dangerous US world economy.

Develop shows that will dismantle the US economy? Are you not watching Jersey Shore?!

For every human born, ACRES of wildlife forests must be turned into farmland in order to feed that new addition over the course of 60 to 100 YEARS of that new human’s lifespan! THIS IS AT THE EXPENSE OF THE FOREST CREATURES!!!!

Anyone else get the feeling that this guy was REALLY upset that Bambi’s mother got shot?

NO MORE BABIES!

I think I speak for everyone when I say we are more than happy that you won’t be breeding.

Saving the environment and the remaning species diversity of the planet is now your mindset. Nothing is more important than saving them. The Lions, Tigers, Giraffes, Elephants, Froggies, Turtles, Apes, Raccoons, Beetles, Ants, Sharks, Bears, and, of course, the Squirrels.

Save the squirrels! Now THAT is a rallying cry.

The humans? The planet does not need humans.

Well, it doesn’t need certain KIND of humans. Maybe ones that walk into workplaces with guns?? Hmmmm?

These are the demands and sayings of Lee.

Fuck you, asshole.

People, we have a government in CRISIS. It has come to my attention that a key cabinet position has gone unfulfilled. This position is of the utmost importance,  and the weightiest of roles- to keep vermin out of the halls of power. Fourtunately, for those of us in the United States we are not effected by the egregious oversight. But our neighbors accross the pond, are IN CRSIS and need us in their time of need. I am going to tell you how I am going to help them in a moment, but, first more about this important government seat of power.

Chief Mouser to the Cabinet Office.

Yes, you read that right. You may think I am making this up, but I don’t make stuff up. On Tuesdays. This exalted position was first held by a cat named Treasury Bill. Unfortunate moniker aside, he did his job so well, that he was replaced by Peter. And Peter was replaced by…well, you can look at the list yourself.

Sybil, the last cat left 10 Downing Street in 2009, reportedly to live out his retirement in the lap of luxury. But, now….NOW? There’s no one! How does this country function each and every day? I get that whole British ‘stiff upper lip’ thing and all, but this goes beyond the pale. And it is a situation that MUST be rectified.

In case you didn’t know, the Prime Minister is off cooing over his new baby. What kind of man goes off to celebrate the addition of his houseold when he knows his country is on the brink. Listen, Mr. Brown, even now as we speak the  mice are planning and plotting. It could be ANY DAY NOW. I implore you to ACT NOW!

Rumor has it that the Queen is not pleased, but sources could not confirm that before press time.

My good readers, keep the UK and its shoddy, broken government in your thoughts. They need all the support they can get.

P.S. I have a killer cat that would be perfect for job, and she might even overlook your funny accents.

P.P.S. – I have outfitted a box for the cat with plenty of airholes (don’t need PETA after me, y’all) now, just tell where to send it to?

P.P.P.S- I’m a giver.

P.P.P.P.S.- Hurry up with the address, she’s biting through the box.

My kids are at camp for the week, and I’m taking the time to catch up at work. You know, the job that ACTUALLY pays the bills. So I am featuring two guest posts. The second (and last) is from Kelli (aka GuiltySquuid). She has become a close friend, and I’m lucky to have found her. She made me promise to publish this before I saw it, I swear I didn’t pay her to write it. And it may have touched my heart. Could have been indigestion, who knows. You can find her here. You can find Tuesday’s guest post from Bejewell here. These two women deserve to be read, a lot. Go do that. Not now, AFTER you read this post:

Last week, before Amy went to Blogher, she asked me to write a guest post for her. That night was insane. The same day she asked me I was coming off of two anxiety attacks in 24 hours, I was getting ready for my photoshoot for BBC2011, and I was packing to take my kids on a last minute vacation out of town.

In a nutshell? I was a mess. A hot mess. A horrible, barely held together mess who was likely to crack into a million pieces at any time.

For anyone else last week I would have said no, but this was Amy. Because Amy does a lot for everyone in her online network and she does it while asking very little in return. She will happily and cheerfully fix a broken blog while wielding snarky comments to keep you laughing and recognizing that the world has not ended and that yes, it can be fixed. She can be the glue that holds it all together.

So, after a late night of frantic packing, planning and downloading my Tom-Tom updates to install on my iPhone 4, I shut off the outside world and worked on a piece for Amy. I was actually pretty proud of it. It’s funny and full of pictures and basically the kind of post that makes me happy. Then I copied and pasted the code into a notepad file, attached it to an email and finally drug my tired ass to bed to wake up a few hours later to drive 100 miles to get my picture taken in a closet. (True story.)

I guess that in the updates on the phone and my exhaustion, I didn’t notice that the email came back as undeliverable.

And as we all know, Amy had a hard time at Blogher.

But she posted something else and I guess I just assumed that she didn’t like my post, or it didn’t fit her site, or something.

She assumed I hadn’t done it and blew her off.

Tonight we IMed about it all and all is well and I said I’d fire up the laptop and send her post off to her.

But instead? I have all of this rattling around in my head and I wanted to give y’all a little something different.

The Amys of the world are few and far between. Very few people give so generously of themselves and ask nothing in return. Amy has been really good to me since I came back and really started blogging to blog for real. She’s been a support system, a fantastic and selfless promoter of me, and she’s read every word I’ve written and commented on it. She’s included me in the amazingly awesome Blogger Body Calendar and given me an opportunity to do something for my daughter I would have never had the courage to do on my own. In short, she’s been a real friend.

The thing about me? Is that I think I’m probably a difficult friend to have, really. I am alternately needy and then so busy I don’t have time to talk for days. I get caught up in things and people have to practically YELL at me to get me to focus on something else for even a few minutes. Sometimes? I think I just imagine that my friends will be there to pick up where I left off and it all be okay.

I have a difficult time navigating the world of “girlfriends”, and that’s not easy for me to admit to you all.

I suspect it’s probably because my largest formative influences weren’t women at all. I’ve never been great at sustaining relationships with women and it’s likely due to the fact that a girl’s very fist real “girlfriend” is usually their mother and believe me when I tell you that I never had that kind of relationship with my mother.

So, I often miss the subtle context clues that other women pick up on with each other. I gravitate towards friendships with guys who don’t notice the awkwardness in me as much as women do. Or, if they do, they’ve never said. With guys, I can just hang. It’s all good and I don’t feel like I have to think about it as much. It’s a little different if it’s a guy I have real feelings for, because then? Like all relationships, it has the potential to get complicated and I don’t do well with complicated. I end up locked in a closet having an anxiety attack. That actually happens to me more than I care to admit.

Anyway, I’m getting off topic here. The point I’m trying to make is that I’m not good at the girlfriend type relationships. I have a few close girlfriends. I’ve made a few recently that I’m as comfortable with as I am with any guy. I’ve made one who is so perfect at just TELLING me what I’m missing and WHY that detail is important. But as far as I’ve come in this area (and believe me, it’s really come a long way) I’ve still got a long way to go.

I need to be better at noticing when a friend says something that is to point out that something is wrong. I need to be better at asking questions. I need to not feel (thank you all of my guy friends) that every problem a girlfriend has is one to be fixed. Sometimes, a girl has just gotta vent.

But mostly? I need to remember that friends like Amy are few and far between and sometimes. They need a little of what they give out to be given back to them. And I feel like lately I’ve failed her in that.

I hate that she didn’t have a great time at Blogher. Blogher, quite frankly, scares the holy hell out of me. It’s a social minefield that I’m not at all sure I’m prepared for navigating. But, I am sorry mostly that I couldn’t be there to say, “You know what? Let’s just go see the statue of liberty and talk.” or something that would have given her a good memory of her trip.

Basically, this whole new post is to say, Amy? Thank you.

And also? I’m sorry.

I know I’m an asshole, but thank you for being my friend in spite of that.

Diving back into blogging like I meant it has meant I’ve had to do a lot of things differently, and Amy has been there for me. To answer questions, to listen, to encourage or to just listen to me bitch. I’ve made more friends through the social networking involved that I could have possibly imagined.

Basically, I learning what’s so great about having a network of girlfriends and one of my biggest supporters has been Amy from the beginning.

Today I am appreciating Amy.

That is all.

P.S. This post may not seem like a typically Guilty Squid post, but that’s because I have DEPTH people. Layers, even. I’m a veritable seven layer did with two kinds of chips for sampling.

P.P.S. Unless some of the layers are fish and/or mushrooms.

P.P.P.S. There isn’t another one, I just liked the way the post scripts were flowing. I wasn’t ready to stop.

My kids are at camp for the week, and I’m taking the time to catch up at work. You know, the job that ACTUALLY pays the bills. So I am featuring two guest posts. The first, today, is from Bejewell. She was among the first bloggers I read, and she doesn’t get near enough exposure. She cracks me up all the time. When she went on hiatus/ break, I silently kept hoping she would come back. And she did. But before she did, I snagged her for a guest post. Thursday will be a post from Guiltysquid. These two women deserve to be read, a lot. Go do that. Not now, AFTER you read this post:

Top Five Reasons Why This Guest Post Will Suck

1. I’m on hiatus. About three months ago I put myself in a blogging time out and sent the Bean on summer vacation.  It was my own personal version of Eric Cartman’s “Screw you guys, I’m going home.”  (And if you don’t know that reference, get thee to a South Park marathon, pronto.  Pretty sure there’s one on, somewhere.)  So I haven’t written a single word in three months, unless you count the stupid captions of the ridiculous Photoshopped pictures of the Bean doing summer vacationy-type things, which I keep posting even though my mom and a couple of spinsters in East Peoria are the only people left visiting my blog.  (And I’m not so sure about my mom.)
2. Let’s just say, I’m a little rusty.
3. I’ve been on vacation. The Bean’s not the only one taking a summer break.  I spent all last week in sunny, 70-degree San Diego with my family, doing the zoo and the beach and Walt Disney.  (And if you’re muttering “That’s what she said” right now, you are both gross AND awesome and we should totally be friends.)
4. I’m no longer on vacation. My vacation ended this weekend and I came home to Austin, Texas, where it is currently ONE MILLION degrees outside and I actually have to WORK for a living and there is no beach or love or happiness of any kind.  I would say something here about how Austin and my job and everyone in the world can SUCK IT but I’m too busy icing myself down so I don’t burst into flames.
5. I didn’t get to go to BlogHer. I want to write a clever guest post, I really do — but honestly I just can’t think of ANYTHING except how spectacularly awe-tastic BlogHer ’10 was.  I didn’t actually go to BlogHer ‘10, but I know it was the BEST TIME EVER HAD BY ANYONE EVER IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD because I cannot open Facebook or Twitter or the Internet without being smacked in the face by a zillion messages from all directions reminding me of that amazing fact.  “We all got SOOOOOO drunk at BlogHer!”  “So-and-So HUGGED ME at BlogHer!”  “Can you BELIEVE we’re at BLOGHER?!?!”  “OH NO BlogHer is over, I’m so sad I just want to CRY BUCKETS!”  Yeah, I kind of want to cry, too.  But only because I can’t actually, physically stab you in the face.  Sadly, I’m limited to stabbing you only with my mind.  And I AM, people.  Believe me. In my mind you all have stabbed faces.
6. I’m bitter and hateful and jealous and petty and mean. Pretty sure this goes without saying, but let’s just make it #5 and call it a post, shall we?

I won’t be going to see the new Julia Robert’s movie Eat, Pray, Love. In fact, every time a trailer comes on for it on the TV, it’s all I can do not to run screaming from the house.

If you don’t know the story, the movie is based on a book which is based on a trip that overindulged white woman had to take to find herself. Read that sentence again, because I mean EVERY WORD.

I get it. A middle aged woman has lost her ‘gusto’ for life. She was going through a nasty divorce, and perhaps even lost her country home. Believe me, I know how traumatizing losing a country home can be. So she decides to…wait for it…take a year off. Wow, why didn’t I think of that?! Yes, she takes a year off and goes to Italy, India and Bali. She is going to how to learn how to eat, pray, and love. And then- THEN- she is going to come back to the US and write a book about it, so that we can all experience her self-indulged year-long temper tantrum. Seriously.

First, let’s be practical. This trip cost her well over $100,000. AT LEAST. That doesn’t include the lost wages and opportunities. Do you have that kind of money? Neither do I. And if I did, I wouldn’t waste it on a trip to commune with elephants for a year. My kids need to go to college, yo.

But never fear, she is going to get her money back. And then some. Who’s going to give it to her? All of us who fawn over her and soak up her bits of wisdom as if she is the second coming of Ghandi. We are going to buy her book (cha-ching), her perfume (cha-ching), buy her trip-inspired merchandise on HSN (CHA-CHING, BABY!). We will be the poorer, she the richer and will you have learned something profound from it all?

No.

I mean it, you won’t.

Let’s imagine for a moment that you could take this wonderful trip- that you could pause your home, career, kids (don’t forget this woman does not have kids. And she needs to get away from stress? That lady does not know stress.) and go to where ever you need to go to ‘find’ yourself.

A couple of things will become apparent:

1) Ms. Gilbert’s realizations will not be your realizations. Yours would be different. Therefore to read about hers are meaningless.

2) The world will move on without you. Your friends will go away, you job will go away, and all will be unforgiving about your need for discovery.

3) Your book will suck and no one will buy it.

4) You will not look like Julia Roberts or meet someone like Javier Bardem.

Save your money and your time. You don’t need to go to India or Bali or Italy to find your zest for life. You don’t need to buy the book, the perfume, the clothes to get in touch with your inner self. Trust me.

Really…

I wasn’t.

It’s no secret that I hated BlogHer, that I left early, that I didn’t….fit in.

It’s true. I didn’t want to admit that, I didn’t want to be upset by it. I want to move on. But I can’t write anything until I write this post. Nothing else will come to mind.

So I vowed to change, to be more likable, to be less me. Smile more, chat more, pretend to be interested more.

And then I know if I do that, I would never write again. Not. A. Single. Word.

To realize that I was a NOT- not ‘part’ of the group, not invited when other bloggers I knew got together, not in the right place- cut me to the core.

Where does that leave me? The same place I have always been. On the outside looking in, on the periphery.

There are people that I finally got to meet in NY that I loved, and will go out of my way to meet again. Others I had been dying to meet, but a few seconds with them was more than I needed to realize that they were not for me.

I couldn’t find my mojo, my verve, my awesomeness.

This is the part where I vow never to set foot in BlogHer again. Except I can’t. Cause I might.

I’m hardcore like that.

I laugh when people say “I was overwhelmed, too.” Not at their kindness, for that is what it is. And I am grateful that they extend it to me. But I laugh nonetheless.

These people forget what I do for a living.

I work for people who are mentioned on the news, a company with billions in revenue. When I walk into rooms, and the company that I work for is printed on my name tag- people come to me.

I am not overwhelmed, nothing about this experience can overwhelm me more than the work I do on a daily basis.

But I am in distress nonetheless. A distress and sadness that is pushed down and put into nice little boxes and set on a shelf. Until the shelf is full, and I have no more boxes.

The waves of sadness come in, and threaten to overwhelm. One wave after another…

I am divorced.

I am single.

I am broke.

I am busy.

There are too many emails to return, calls to make, appointments to keep.

To go under is inevitable for women in my family. We always do. Sometimes for moments, sometime for years, sometimes more.

We are shipwrecked and marooned on our island with only our depression to keep us company. Until we tire of the sadness, the loneliness, the emptiness.

Then we wade into the water and head for shore. We take a piece of depression with us, but we are grateful for those who who extend their hand to help pull us up.

The new friends.

The old friends.

Family.

We know that we will be overwhelmed and sad again, and we get out our boxes and start to fill them up. Until we end up on the island again.

But I have hope. Because even though every woman in my family knows depression inside and out, even though we have sat on that island and contemplated the depths of our despair. We always swim back.

We always come back,

Always.