St. Valentine's Day Massacre... Take Two?

Before two years ago, I hated Valentine’s Day. I did. I thought it was a holiday created by Hallmark to make women in bad relationships feel terrible about themselves. And though I now have DB, whom I love more than life, I'm still not certain I feel all that differently. After all, you're only paranoid if you're wrong. That said, unlike my dear friend and boss, I never actually felt like Cupid was out to get me. Seriously. This brilliant and adorable woman has literally spent February 14th in the hospital... SEVERAL TIMES.

This is why you should never put your life in the hands of a toddler with a weapon. It's like giving a shotgun to a monkey. Nothing good can come of it.

I'm not joking, her Valentine's Day sagas go something like this… Freshman year of college, she was severely dehydrated from the flu and ended up in the Emergency Room with an IV. As a sophomore, her appendix ruptured and she ended up having surgery. During her junior year, she was in a car accident and ended up in the Emergency Room again with a bad case of whiplash. By her senior year, she realized that Cupid was an asshole, so she stayed inside her apartment - safe and sound, thereby breaking the curse... until yesterday, when she fell under her own car on the way to work. All on Valentine's Day.

As she stood in my cube, telling me why she so justifiably hated this holiday, I told her that I loved her dearly, which I do (as a boss and as a friend), but I wanted her NO WHERE NEAR ME. Between her luck and mine, our office would have burned to the ground, and we had the innocent lives of our co-workers to consider. So... we avoided each other like the plague. And, though I missed seeing her all afternoon, my Valentine's Day was actually very lovely.

However, you know the deal. Before I can tell you that part of the story, I have to tell you this part first.

Around this time two years ago, DB and I went on our first "date." It was lunch, which seemed harmless enough. I mean really… how many women fall in love over Pad Thai? Turns out this one did (as well as scads of women across Asia, I’ll bet). I wasn't looking for him. In fact, I had been in a bad marriage and gone through an awful divorce, and the last thing I wanted was a relationship. And yet - there he was, this single dad and dear friend, who so charming and sexy and funny and brilliant, that I didn’t stand a chance. By the time I could say, “Check please” it was game over. That said, truth be told, in the back of my head, I knew I loved him long before that moment. It’s probably why it took me three months and thousands of e-mails, text messages and late night conversations to actually say, “Yes” when he asked me out.

And as we sat at that same Thai restaurant yesterday, I realized that I cannot live without him. So, as terrified as I am, I’m marrying him. Yes, this amazing, calm, blues-playing, Buddhist man is officially off the market. I will never know what he sees in me, but I know that I will love and adore him all of my life. With that, I hope you’re prepared for all of the posts that revolve around planning a wedding. I’m sure they will be insane… scratch that… more insane. And to my dear friend (and boss), maybe Cupid isn’t an asshole or a hit man after all. Maybe he’s just trying to help you land a doctor. Or, better yet... maybe he's just trying to help a doctor land you.

Talk to you next week.

Department of Corrections

Although it sounds more like gerbil rage than Whitman prose or Viking roar, about once a week, I use mkromd to sound my barbaric YAWP over the roofs of the world. Too bad the only people who read it are the ones who personally know me and love me regardless (and have heard all of it before) but indulge me anyway because I mercilessly badger them until they break down and comply. That said, being the totally shallow human being that I am, I’m completely OK with that… Because, you see, I really need/want to analytically dominate the Indonesian Blog, ketwawa lucu, and each visitor gets me one step closer to victory.

In other words, I want to break our international stalemate of five followers each.

Now, please understand something. I am immeasurably grateful for the five of you that I have. I honestly and sincerely appreciate each person and his or her time; however, there is one reader whom I simply cannot imagine a world without. Enter my oldest and dearest friend on this planet, MA. May each of you have a friend just like her - that person from college who you love instantly and stay close to - all of your life… the keeper of your memories and your secrets… and the one who was there for every adult-oriented, life-changing event that has ever happened to you. Grad school… first marriage… first job. Children being born… parents passing away. Divorce… second job… second marriage. The friend you cannot call to bail you out of prison because she’s in the cell beside you. Yes, that friend. And I’d like to introduce her into the cast of characters that are mkromd regulars. Because… in a way, this whole blog/site is her fault.

But, as always, before I can tell you that part of the story, I have to tell you this part first.

When MA and I met, almost two decades ago, we were not only broke grad students (who happened to be neighbors), she also became my boss (who let me share her office). I was doing my MBA in Marketing at the time and desperately needed a job… and she was an Editor who had just finished her Master’s Degree in Communications and kind-of needed a Technical Writer. Whether it was out of pity or love is irrelevant, she hired me, and the rest – as they say – is history. She honestly taught me everything I know about business writing… the hard way. Because, she may have the face of a Botticelli angel, but she swears like a sailor and edits like Chuck Norris. No lie, she once had a staring contest with a manual that I wrote for her, and I swear… the book blinked before she did.

This is a woman who once beat me with my own edits. Really. She actually rolled up the document and beat me with it (knowing that I bruise like a peach, but I'm not bitter). When I told her, “I have the right to be comfortable in my place of employment,” she simply replied, “So do I and this kind of shitty writing puts me on edge. Fix it.” Clearly, this is why I love her to bits and wouldn't trade or change her for all of the tea in China. She’s a great editor, who is an even better writer, but she is also a fabulous support structure, human being, and friend. And... since I know she's reading this, let me say this to her directly: Please don't beat me for the typos in this post.

On that note, I won’t be talking to you next week. I’ll be hitting the slopes instead. Talk to you the week after.

Snowplow Drivers Blow

Years ago, my father told me, "A joke's not funny unless everyone laughs at the punch line." And while I might not always practice what he preached, I honestly try to. However, this week, I'm about to let snowplow drivers have it. So, if you happen fall into that professional demographic, you probably won’t see the humor in this post and may not want to keep reading. But, if you do continue on, and you’re offended – I am sorry… kind of.


Dear Snowplow Driver,

Before I say another word, it should be stated that I sincerely appreciate and applaud the work you do. I mean that. It cannot be easy to get up at 4:00 in the morning, get into a cold truck, and plow several feet of snow off the roads so that people can safely get where they need to go. Really, kudos to you for that; however, is it really fucking necessary to repeatedly push enough snow and ice into my driveway that I could sink the Titanic with it? Is it?

Seriously, thanks to you, every single day I have a wall of snow at the foot of my driveway that can only be described as a small iceberg. In fact, you should know that I actually asked my friend if I could borrow her sailboat, because I had a plan… a cunning plan, a plan - to quote the Black Adder that was, “so cunning you could slap a tail on it and call it a weasel.” I was going to park her sailboat in my yard, let you push your tsunami-sized wave of snow onto it, then have a black tie party on the boat… complete with life jackets for all and a band playing, “Nearer my God to Thee.”

Who knew there were local ordinances like that to protect civil servants like you from angry tax payers like me?

Sincerely - M. Kro, M.D.


At any rate, after I ran the idea past a neighbor, who is also our town Mayor and who told me no, I texted TB and said, “Since the city won’t let me go down with the ship and I can’t fight city hall, our Titanic party is a failed launch. Lunch?” She replied, “Our? Your. And if you have enough money to host a Titanic re-enactment party, then you have enough money for a damn snow blower. See you at noon.” How she can call a spade a spade in 160 characters or less, I have NO idea.

That said, she has clearly missed the boat on this one (pun intended).

The point isn't whether or not I can afford a snow blower (kind of). The point is that I’m tired of being a victim of his passive aggressive sense of humor, so I have chosen to make him a victim of mine. When I explained this over lunch, TB said, “I don’t think too many snow plow drivers read your blog.” I hate it when she’s right. But, to make me feel better, she gave me a copy of the soundtrack to Titanic, which I downloaded to my iPod. And though my rage is impotent and I cannot exact my revenge through rapier wit, I have new music to listen to while I shovel… again and again and again.

Talk to you next week.

A house divided against itself cannot stand

About two weeks ago, DB's daughter said, "mkromd, be alert - the world needs more lerts." And I laughed. In fact, I laughed all afternoon. I thought it was funny and clever and quick-witted. Then, later that day, I listened to National Public Radio (NPR) and heard about the Arizona Congresswoman and several others who were shot at a rally, and I sat in my car... in a parking lot… in shock... and I wept. Several people were killed, including a child, and many more were seriously wounded.

How have we come to this? How have we come to a place where, regardless of the motive, this could happen?

Now, please understand something. I don't pretend to be wise or eloquent, and I don't pretend to have answers. In fact, often times I simply accept the fact that when 'two roads diverge in a yellow wood,' I will take the one destined to get hit by a mudslide. But I'm heartsick. To my core, I am heartsick, and I cannot remain silent about what has happened: that for all of the problems in this world that require us to work together as a species… problems like global warming, hunger, poverty and war… we have chosen to be polarized. Problems that (to loosely quote Kennedy) ‘were created by men and must be solved by men’ which cannot be discussed let alone resolved because we cannot agree to civilly disagree.

Again, how have we come to this?

I wish I knew. With all my soul and every fiber of my being, I wish that I could scream loud enough or cry hard enough that someone, somewhere would stand up and make it stop. That said, it’s happening. This insanity has finally gone too far and people from every background and belief system are now standing together and saying, “ENOUGH! I will no longer tolerate or participate in your intolerance.” And I intend to lend my voice to theirs… because, at the end of the day, Margaret Mead really was right, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has.”

And things NEED to change.

So, with that – forgive me. I’m going to break my own rule for this blog and disregard the advice a dear friend’s husband once gave to me, “Never discuss politics or religion with a person unless you’ve slept together… and even then – only if they know your real name… and even then – only if they ask you for your opinion.”

Here it goes… I’m going to pull out my soapbox and preach.

Dictionary.com defines alert as, “fully aware and attentive; wide-awake; keen.” So, if that’s the case, what does it mean to a lert? Since Webster never took a stab at that, I will. To me, a lert is someone who is present and kind and patient. They agree that love is stronger than hatred and that to change the world for the better - we have to change ourselves for good. But most importantly, they don't just finish the rest of Kennedy’s aforementioned quote... they live it,” No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings.” So, take DB’s beautiful daughter’s advice. Be a lert. The world needs more of them.

Talk to you next week, and I promise I won’t preach at you.

NOTE: This was written two weeks ago after U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was shot. I'm happy to say that she's recovering, but it was still a tragic waste of human lives.

We're watching you...

I have a confession to make. I'm addicted to analytics. It's sad (and slightly nerdy), but it's also very true. Seriously, as sick as this may sound, every day I wake up, have a cup of coffee, and log into mkromd to read and reply to your comments. Then I log into a back-end tool that allows me to see:
• What URLs are sending traffic to me (e.g. Facebook and Google).
• Which search terms people are using to find me (e.g. george carlin + my karma ran over my dogma).
• Where the people who read mkromd are geographically located (e.g. US, Canada, etc).

They're not person specific, I promise. It's way more generic and high-level than that. But it’s an addiction I’m forced to feed. At any rate, a couple weeks ago, during the Horray for Heifer drive, I reviewed my site stats and saw the funniest search string... EVER. How it brought them to mkromd, I have NO idea.

It said, "best nude babe touching boobs."

Now, for those of you who know me, and many of you do, I am by no means the best nude babe on the Internet. In fact, I’m only naked under my clothes, and as for the whole “touching boobs” thing… the only time I touch my boobs is to scoop them up and put them into a bra. Middle age is cruel. And… to prove my point, a while ago... before I went home to Appalachia for the holidays... I was standing in my bathroom… looking in the mirror… talking on the phone to my mom... and asking her how old she was when her face started sliding down her face.

She didn’t even have the decency to pause. She simply said, “About your age.”

After I thanked her for that touching mother-daughter bonding moment, I texted TB and said, “Let’s go drink like men then shop like women.” Now this is nothing new for us. There’s a restaurant near our mall that serves fabulous margaritas, so we went to dinner, had a few drinks, and walked over to Ann Taylor and Banana Republic.

The good news is that I found a GORGEOUS dress for a great price. The bad news is that it was a size two. TB, being the true best friend that she is… looked at me and said, “Are you too drunk to read the tag? It's a SIZE TWO.” After I reminded her that she was a bitch but I loved her anyway, I took it into the dressing room and proceeded to try it on. Around twenty minutes and a hundred expletives later, I got the damn thing on. It looked obscene... but I got it on. The problem is that I couldn’t get it off.

I had to ask TB to come into the dressing room and help me.

Do you know that she actually walked in… saw me… and walked out. She abandoned me. After a decade of codependent, dignity-compromising moments, she left me there to fend for myself. And worse than that, I could hear her laughing… from the FRONT OF THE STORE. Being the great best friend that I am, I called her cell phone and said, “Get your skinny ass back here and get me out of this dress, or I swear to God - I will wear it to the register and buy it, and you will have to walk back to your car with me looking like this.” Needless to say, she was back before I could hang up.

This is how you know you have the right best friend. Well, that and what happened next.

She literally stood on the dressing room bench, bent me over, and put her foot on my head to push me out of that fucking thing. I swear it was designed by Kafka. So there we were, trying to peel me out of this dress, when she said… “Sorry sweetie, you’re stuck. The good news is that it totally shows off your back-cleavage.” The saddest part of this WHOLE story is that she was right. I honestly looked like a human push-me, pull-me. It was so tight that, while I may have looked like a C cup in the front, I definitely looked like a D cup in the back. Anyway, I’m pleased to report that we were successful (eventually).

But I digress…

The point is this: Irony is as cruel as karma, and they often go hand-in-hand. Because - now, when some hormonal fifteen year old boy DOES Google "best nude babe touching boobs," he won't get pictures of a drunken twenty-one year old co-ed from "Girls Gone Wild." Instead, he will be directed to mkromd... a blog about mid-life crisis women gone crazy... which can ALSO be found by using the search string, "lesbians + shaved head." And these boys will have no one to blame but themselves if they're traumatized.

Talk to you next week.

Let’s Mambo

Three things…

• First of all, Happy New Year. I hope your holiday season was safe and warm.
• Secondly, thank you for donating your time and thoughts to mkromd. In return, I’m pleased to report that we have officially purchased honeybees for Heifer International.
• Thirdly, sorry for the belated post. I was visiting my family in Appalachia.

It was good to go home, but I'm glad to be back. And, I don't know what you were up to at midnight on the 31st, but after kissing DB goodnight and heading up to bed, I laid there thinking about what I did and didn’t accomplish in 2010 and making resolutions for what I intend to achieve in 2011.

Here’s what I didn’t do:

• I didn’t lose ten pounds. Instead, I found fifteen.
• I didn’t read “The Art of Happiness” by the Dalai Lama. Instead, I listened to it on CD… and I lied about it... to a Zen Buddhist Roshi.

No, it's true. I did. Last week, DB and I had lunch with a local Teacher who asked what I thought of the book, and instead of admitting that I cheated, I said, “To quote his Holiness, ‘‘The secret to happiness is honesty and kindness.” And, even though I added, “However, to also quote the great Groucho Marx, ‘If you can fake that, you've got it made,” I’m pretty sure I put another nail in my own karmic coffin. But really, let's be honest... if I get caught on that, it's like catching Al Capone on tax evasion. It's a karmic technicality.

At any rate, this year I vow to:

• Lose fifteen pounds.
• Not get a Chihuahua. Not get a Chihuahua. Not get a Chihuahua. Not get a Chihuahua.
• Post every week. I just don’t promise that it will be funny or relevant to anyone but me.
• Run twice a week, and not just to the vending machine for a Snickers.
• Not get a Chihuahua. Not get a Chihuahua. Not get a Chihuahua. Not get a Chihuahua.
• Keep my promise to DB and finish, Eckhart Tolle’s, “A New Earth: Awakening to your Life’s Purpose.” In his defense, he gave it to me two years ago before we started dating. In my defense, I’ve tried to read it. It’s about learning to extinguish your ego, and the thing is… I like my ego. In fact, I like it so much that sometimes I take it to Ann Taylor for shoes or out to dinner and a movie.
• Not get a Chihuahua. Not get a Chihuahua. Not get a Chihuahua. Not get a Chihuahua.

Did I mention the Chihuahua? You see, my mom has one, and I never thought I would want or love an accessory dog, but I need this animal. He’s five pounds and has the soul of a Mastiff. His name is Cisco, and I cannot walk into a room without picking him up and bellowing out, “Let’s MAAAAMBO!” Then, I’m so shameless that I dance him around the house singing, “Cisco loves Mambo”… Yes, just like Perry Como. And regardless of the fact that my nieces and nephews love when I do it, my mom swears her dog hates it (even though his eyes say otherwise).

Anyway, that’s it for now. I have to get started on the rest of my New Year’s Resolutions. Talk to you next week.

*tap tap tap* Is this thing on?

Let's leave this until next week to get as much money for Heifer as possible. Talk to you next week. --

Just when I thought no one was paying attention because the Indonesian Blog, kewtawa lucu, is kicking my ass, someone sent me a note me about Nathan Bransford, who is raising money for a wonderful cause, Heifer International. Here’s the deal, if I link to his site and this cause, he will redirect people to my site to keep it going. So we should REALLY do this! For each comment that you post on mkromd, I will donate 25 cents on your behalf (up to $50 total).

Now, if you aren’t familiar with this organization, they use donations like this to purchase sustainable items for indigenous people around the world, many of whom I’ve personally offended at one point in time or another and need to apologize to en masse. Hopefully this will help me make amends (and improve my karma). And... for those of you who regularly read my blog, you know I need all the help I can get. You even already know that years ago, in college, when I studied in Sardinia, I was attacked by a passive-aggressive hair stylist who shaved my head. But, what you don't know is that, as tragic as that event may have been, it was far from the worst thing that's ever happened to me abroad.

That probably happened in India, after I graduated from college.

You see, every year my large co-dependent family vacations together in a place we've never been before. It's true, we pick some unfortunate destination and descend en-masse, and one year we decided to go to Asia. At any rate, there we were, visiting a mosque in India, when someone suggested that we see the, “lesser known Poor Man’s Taj Mahal.” If you've never heard of it, don't be alarmed. It’s more like a roadside attraction than it is a mosque, but the rules still apply: men can go inside, women cannot, and everyone has to take off their shoes regardless.

So there I was... walking around... outside... in India... without shoes on... when I stepped in bird poop.

If you know nothing about me, please know this - I’m a complete germ-a-phobe; however, luckily for me, there was a big pool of water right there. And, as a recently-graduated, culturally-sensitive Anthropologist, I hopped over to it and stuck my bird poop covered foot RIGHT in. No kidding, about twenty-five men immediately ripped their hands out of there the second I'd touched it. Being the polite idiot that I am, I was loudly apologizing/explaining and showing them my foot while saying, “Sorry – I stepped in crap and I need to get it off.”

Now, if you know anything about Islam, then you probably know the following:
1. That’s holy water and it’s used for men to clean themselves before they pray. Women don’t use it… EVER!
2. Never show a Muslim the bottom of your feet. It’s like giving them the finger.
3. Either one of these things is offensive.
4. Both of these things together can be life-threatening.

I now know that too…

That said, as I’m writing this, it dawns on me that the poop "incident" wasn't actually the worst one. The worst was definitely when I was living and working in London because of an international assignment. I tried to warn my boss this was a bad idea, but it wasn’t until I lost my knickers on High Street that he agreed.

However, before I can tell you that part of the story, I have to tell you this part first.

You see, one morning, I’d gotten up and headed into the office to prep for a big meeting with my manager and his peers, all of whom are men. However, because God hates me, I didn't get to work early at all. In fact, I got there late because of traffic on the M25. Already tardy and frustrated, I quickly grabbed my stuff from the car and accidentally slammed the door on myself - which naturally resulted in a MASSIVE tear in my nylons. As I looked at my watch, I realized that I could pull it off (no pun intended) and literally JAUNTED (in heels) to Woolworths on High Street for a new pair.

Though I was able to successfully repress most of what happened next, I still remember running into the store, grabbing a pair of pantyhose off the rack, looking at the back of the package, and realizing that this wasn’t going to end well for me. You see, the problem with buying clothes in England is that the height and weight charts are metric.

Do you know how many stones you weigh or how many meters tall you are? OMG… ME EITHER!

But I grabbed a pair anyway and hauled back to the office where I went into the bathroom, pulled off my nylons, pitched the torn ones into the garbage, and opened the new pack. Clearly God hates me, because when I opened them, they were thigh-highs… for an Amazon. I’m five foot two, and in NO parallel universe would those have worked - even if I'd had a garter-belt, which I didn't.

So there I was, eyeballing the torn ones in the trash and running the numbers in my head, when I realized that it would require a lifetime of therapy if I went dumpster diving for my own used clothes. Instead, I tried to make my B Plan work.

I literally PULLED MY NYLONS THROUGH THE TOP OF MY UNDERWEAR AND TIED THEM TOGETHER IN THE BACK.

After fifteen minutes of sheer hell (no pun intended), I walked over to my boss’s office, shut his door and said, “We have a problem.” It was (quite literally) five minutes before one of the biggest presentations of my life, so he was clearly upset by this declaration and asked why. That's when I stamped my right foot three times, and my thigh-high fell to the floor... engulfing my shoe. As we stood there, staring at each other, not sure what to say, the left thigh-high fell to the floor, too. And no, I hadn’t shaved. That’s when my boss said, “Take the damn things off and tell them you’re French. Let’s go.”

To think I was scared of what could happen on our last family vacation to Peru. No kidding, I was genuinely terrified that I’d hear a blow dart and wake up days later in some South American jungle hut without a kidney. Since that didn’t happen, I clearly still have amends to make before my karma can improve, so PLEASE help me out. Give to Heifer International. Or, post a comment and I will make a donation on your behalf (up to $50 total from mkromd).

Have a great holiday! Talk to you next week.