Its a marvelous night for a moondance

I've been peer pressured into reading Twilight. I'm not proud to admit this, but it's not like I really have anything better to do, aside from watch reruns of Rehab: Party at the Hard Rock Hotel on TruTV.

So, I'm halfway through the book last night, and I realize not a damned thing has happened. The only real action in the book, after 200 pages, occurs when it's insinuated that the main character, Bella, may be about to be raped. This is never explicitly stated, of course; the author just uses approximately 1,578 words to describe that Bella is followed down an alley by a group of older dudes, and that one or more of said dudes may have had nefarious thoughts about her. Truly riveting literature.

I can understand teens and pre-teens enjoying this book - it's their generation's Sweet Valley High. What I don't get are the millions of housewives that are simply ga-ga over this weird, teenage forbidden love story in which no actual love acts take place. Seems to me like a Harlequin novel would be a more...fulfilling alternative.

Until it sleeps

Someone in the cubes behind me is listening to heavy metal on their computer. A) They have terrible taste, and B) It's giving me a headache. What is the best office retaliation?

That's just my baby daddy

I'm terrible at Halloween. Each year, I deliver the most uninspired "costumes" known to man, if I bother to dress up at all. This year, I was prepared to sit at home and watch Night of the Living Dead while eating a year's supply of Reese's cups, but a last-minute house guest had me digging through my closet at 9:30pm for any semblance of a Halloween costume.

Although I could've easily joined the ranks of the 13,549 Sarah Palins wandering about that night, I knew I would've given myself a headache trying to do the voice. Plus I didn't want to get shot. And so, after ten minutes routing around through my closet, I emerged as a pregnant prom queen. (I'll admit to being somewhat inspired by my recent high school reunion on this one.) I put on an old evening gown and some tacky silver shoes once purchased for a wedding, tossed a small throw pillow under my dress, teased my hair, and popped in about 5 pieces of chewing gum, which I proceeded to snap obnoxiously all night long.

It was met with rave reviews, and was apparently pretty realistic, judging by the two older ladies who stood slack-jawed at the bar as they watched me prop my beer on my faux belly. They were so offended that they even left the bar, although that may have been more immediately prompted by my fiance, the "corrupt cop", doing lines of flour off the pool table with a Cobra Kai student.