Monthly Archives: March 2011

March 30, 2011 · 2:05 pm

Rainbow Brite: All That Shimmers Must Surely Fade

When I was about 4 years old, the world felt like a magical place. Life was filled with new discoveries, friendly animals, and most importantly magical cartoons.

Oh the cartoons.

Those wonderful little VCR tapes were like conveyer belts pulling me into another world. A world that I truly believed existed and I so dearly wished to be a part of.

There was one cartoon character that I loved more than any other. And that was no one other, than the Rainbow Brite.

I loved everything about her and her world. It was so happy and full of color. She and her trusty horse Star Lite would travel across their land spreading color and happiness. And do you know what Star Lite would run on? Rainbows! The girl rode on freakin rainbows! I can’t make this shit up. She was amazing and I hoped with every fiber of my young being, that I could one day see her world.

I wish I could convey to you all how much my soul longed to visit her world called Rainbow Land a place where all the colors of the world are created.

I wanted this so badly, that one time I had a vivid dream I was in Rainbow Land helping Rainbow Brite surf the rainbows. It was all so real, that when I woke up, I actually started crying because I realized it was only a dream. Heartbreaking, I know.

Well something happened one day and my little dream became just inches away from my tiny little grasp.

I imagined meeting Rainbow Brite and she being exactly how she was in her cartoons. I imagined she would whisk me away from the party and take me up into the sky with her rainbows.

But then my mother’s words came crashing down upon my thoughts.

I went into my bedroom to brood. I knew when my mother made up her mind about something there was very little that could change it. But I decided I would try.

No.

I would succeed.

I set my course and proceeded with valor.

First I tested the water with the use of logic:

Did she not hear what I had just said?

I decided it was time to move onto phase 2 of my plan.

I didn’t want to resort to extreme measures, but I told myself that it was my mother’s own fault for arguing against such infallable logic.

I was never much of a temper tantrum child. I was known to get a bit whiny from time to time, but I was going to have to do better than that to change my mother’s mind.

I decided to begin with a “test whine” in order to feel out the air.

Time to take it up a notch.

Looks like she too had a healthy fear of Santa Claus. Wise decision.

I was ecstatic.

In the days and evenings leading up to the party I dreamed of nothing else but of how my day with Rainbow Brite would be.

When the day of the party finally came, my mind was floating through a cloudy haze.

The party was located in town at one of those family pizza places where they had arcade games and bumper cars and you could win prizes by collecting tickets.

As we walked inside, my mother was holding my hand and I was only acutely aware that my arm was practically being pulled out of socket from all my bouncing around.

I was so excited about the fact that in just minutes I would be seeing Rainbow Brite, that I forgot the whole reason we were there.

Mom: Here’s your gift for Rachel. Why don’t you go take it over to her?

Me: Who?

Mom: Rachel! Your friend. The whole reason why we’re here!

She so did not get me.

Throughout the party, I went through the motions of being a good friend.

I played the games.

I watched Rachel open her gifts.

And I actively participated in the singing of “Happy Birthday.”

But even after all that excitement I was still over-anxious to meet my hero.

All of a sudden, I heard someone call out: “Look! Rainbow Brite is here!”

Ok, can we please review what I thought I was getting when the invite said “Rainbow Brite?”

Yeah. that’s right. So imagine my dissapointment when I looked up into the face of this monster.

I could totally see it was a person in a costume. Their wrists were even showing!

Where was Starlite? Where were her magic star crystals? Where was the frikin rainbow?

All the other children had decided that they would take what they could get and gathered around this foam atrocity in a mob of excitement.

I, on the other hand was heartbroken and wanted to stay as far away as possible.

I was hoping to be left alone to sulk in a pool of broken hopes, but upon noticing my isolation, my mother intervened.

Mom: Alexa, why don’t you come play with Rainbow Brite.

Me: That’s not Rainbow Brite.

Mom: Er, sure it is!

Pssh. Poor Mother. I suppose she wanted so badly to believe it was the real Rainbow Brite that she had deluded herself along with the rest of the children. I decided not to steal her innocence and let her have her dream.

Me: Sure Mom. Why don’t you go play with her?

I was hoping to be able to spend the rest of the party sulking and stealing cake, but my mother was going to have nothing of it. I had wanted to be here so damn bad and I was going to enjoy myself by golly.

No I wasn’t.

She was closing in on me and I wanted nothing to do with this imposter. I wanted to get out of there and it didn’t matter to me at what cost.

Mom pulled me aside from the party.

Mom: What is wrong with you? You said you wanted to see Rainbow Brite.

Me: Yeah. And that’s not her!

Mom: Look, you were the one who wanted to come here so badly! You were willing to miss out on Tara’s party…

Me: Tara! That’s right. Hey, do you think we can stop by Tara’s?

Mom: What? No!

Me: Do you think Waddles the Clown is still there?

Mom: No! We’re going home.

Me: So…what, you think he’s gone already?

After that day there were no temper tantrums thrown on my part.

We headed to the car. By that time, the party had pretty much took a turn for the worse and I suppose Rainbow Brite was asked to leave.

When my mom and I drove out of the parking lot, I looked out the window and saw the girl who was in the Rainbow Brite costume. She was at her car getting changed.

As we drove away, the imposter and I made eye contact

We both knew her sins.

Discussion:

Alexa, I’m either Canadian or I’m younger than you and don’t know who Rainbow Brite is. Help me out.

Lucky for you there is actually an entire website dedicated to all that is RBB. So, yes, there is someone out there who obviously loved her more than I did and has grown up and created this amazing url of knowlege to share with the world. It’s at www.rainbowbrite.net

AND……Rainbow Brite is on Twitter!!!!

PS I say “Canadian” because while writing this post, I spoke to some people up here my age and none of them knew who she was, so I’m assuming it was an American thing. Kind of like not recycling.

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Tagged as birthday, Rainbow Brite, Starlite

March 15, 2011 · 8:39 pm

My 3rd Worst Roommate

It was my sophomore year at Texas A&M University in College Station, TX—and for those of you who aren’t from Texas, in my opinion, it’s pretty much the coolest most funarific University ever. But that’s just my opinion.

I was living in the dorms and since none of my friends were going to be in that dorm, I went pot luck again, hoping this time the Collegiate Living Gods might smile upon me with a better roommate than I was given the year before.

I’ve honestly had some really bad luck with roommates in my college life. The problem isn’t something stupid like “she borrowed my headband” or “hooked up with my boyfriend while I was passed out on Sunnybrook Whiskey.”

No, no, no. Those are merely trivial annoyances. My “Bad Roommates” were bad, simply because they were mean people and were pretty mean to me.

P.S. The fact that I mention Sunnybrook Whiskey is a little embarrassing because it pretty much tastes exactly like drinking a shot of suicide.

So this roommate of mine, her name was Brandy. This girl was about 5′ 11” and weighed like 110 pounds. So, she was this incredibly tall, thin blonde who apparently spent her free time as “a model.”

And you better believe she let it be known to anyone who would listen.

The thing about this girl though, was that in the modeling pictures she showed me, she looked pretty good. Like a real model.

But let me just say, that photoshop and airbrush artists must be like optical plastic surgeons.

I’ll put it this way to all you men out there who drool (among other things) over these pictures of models: It is a wonder among wonders, what a computer can do for a person in a picture.
And that’s all I’m going to say about her looks.

So, one of my problems with my roommate, Brandy was the fact that not only was she was an extremely over-dramatic person, but she always acted like talking to me or hanging out with me was an act of charity.

When you have a bad roommate, there are a couple of things you can do to cope. One is to put your differences aside, and try your best to get along. Or you can ignore them.

The problem was, Brandy would always volunteer her “charity” to hang out with me.

I was almost at my wits end until one evening, Brandy brought in her roommate from the year before, Kelly.

Before Kelly came over to hang out, I was very skeptical. I couldn’t picture someone who actually lived with this girl for an entire year, and still remained friends with her.

But when she got to our place, I was completely surprised.

This girl was really nice, had a cool personality and overall was completely normal. She and I hit it off, and I felt like she was someone who I could really be friends with.

What on earth was she doing being friends with Brandy? I wondered.

One evening Brandy invited me to go out to ‘da clubs with her and Kelly.

Me: Sure! That sounds like fun!

Normally when I went out, I would just flat iron my hair. I was still trying to get used to the College Station humidity that was a breeding ground for sweat and frizz. But that evening, for whatever reason, I decided to try something different.

I saw a picture of an up style I liked in a magazine and tried my best to emulate it.

I twisted and sprayed and fussed with my hair and then put a clip in when I finally had it in place.

I was pleased.

Brandy on the other hand, kept changing clothes, and then studying herself in the mirror.

Now, if you are a girl and you ever want to get on my last nerve here’s the easiest way: be really really skinny, and complain that you’re fat. I don’t give a crap about your body image issues. It’s ANNOYING and incredibly BORING.

What especially annoys me is if a girl is skinnier than me, calls herself fat and then looks to me for reassurance. It’s rude.

What I have presented to you in these drawings is an exact artistically accurate depiction of Brandy’s body. And as you can see, she was incredibly skinny.

And she knew it.

What she really wanted was a reaction, and wanted me to fall all over myself and tell her how skinny she was and that she was the greatest model that never was and blah blah. These were the things, that she already bragged about, so why did she need me to tell her?

I adamantly refused to be that girl, and was not going to humor her attempts at a compliment.

So, we’re at the club which was one of the newest bars in town. I can’t remember the name but for those of you who lived in CS, it was on Harvey street, next to the Tap.

Walking into a club at 11pm is like stumbling into a middle of a conversation that’s been going on for the past 5 minutes.

Things have been happening.. You’re not sure what, but everyone around seems to be enjoying themselves. There’s a lot of noise and confusion, but you don’t want to look like you don’t know what’s going on. So you smile and nod your head, and try to look cool without making any major slip ups.

So, we’re in the club and the beat is going.

Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst.

And there some robot repeating something pointless in the background like,

“The beat is a riot. The beat is a riot. The beat is a riot. The beat is, the beat is.The beat is a riot.”

Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst.Oonst.

“The beat is a riot. The beat is a riot. The beat is a riot. The beat is, the beat is.The beat is a riot.”

And then Rihanna comes in repeating an extremely simplistic lyric entirely off key, but that’s ok, because she is the Great Ri-han-na.

“My heart is heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerrrreeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!”

Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst. Oonst.Oonst.

Suddenly, Brandy speaks up and the following conversation takes place:

Brandy: “The stereos are free tonight!”

Kelly: “Sweet!”

Me: “Excuse me?”

“We like to dance on the stereos! Come on!”

Now, there are perfectly legitimate times when those words can be spoken, which I will outline below:

Ok so that last example was a bit of a stretch but I specifically posted it to further illustrate and emphasize how much I did not want to dance on the speakers and subject myself to being “That Girl.”

But there was no stopping Brandy and Kelly.

They were going to hump some dang speakers.

As gracefully as ever humanly possible, I climbed on top of the stereos.

Once up, I started to dance. I’m actually a good dancer, but for obvious reasons, was feeling self conscious being put on display.

Brandy and her crazy long arms were dancing behind me.

It was like she was trying to direct a train wreck with her elbows.

After every few beats, she would then point at a different person in the club. Did she know these people? Probably not.

Now, I’m not a person to make fun of other people’s dancing.

I’m only pointing out her style because of the beating I took over the next few minutes.

So Brandy’s arms were dancing behind me when…

She hit me! It was obviously an accident.

I’d have trouble controlling my arms too if I danced like a coked up Frankenstein.

But then….

My new hair style!

I tried to move away, but there wasn’t anywhere to go on these speakers.

The thing was, Brandy didn’t even seem to notice or was pretending not to.

I wasn’t just going to stand there and subject my self to be reapeatidly slapped in the head. So, I decided it was time that my little adventure on the speakers needed to come to and end.

It was just a matter of getting down……
But it was too crowded on the floor around us.

Skanky people were all around me. Here I was getting beat up, and they were too focused on grinding with each other in rhythm to notice my distress.

I kept trying to find a route down from this makeshift stage of lost dignity, but the dance floor was getting thicker and thicker with people and they were coming closer and closer to me.

Well, apparently dancing in top of the speakers wasn’t something they encouraged in this particular establishment.

One of the bouncers came over and motioned for us to get off.
While Brandy cocked an attitude with the guy, I was desperately trying to get his help.

Finally the bald bouncer man must have noticed my look of distress….

…and cleared the crowd and finally helped me down.

In the end, we finished the rest of the night dancing on the floor.

Later in the school year, Brandy ended up moving in with her older sister so she wouldn’t have to pay for the dorms.

We didn’t keep in touch.

And as it turned out, Kelly and I had another mutual friend, so I didn’t have to go through Brandy after all.

In case you’re wondering; the roommate I had before is ranked as the 2^nd Worst Roommate I’ve Ever Had. So, I guess if we want to get technical, you could say that Brandy was an improvement.

Discussion:

So, this girl was your 3rd Worst Roommate. Are you ever going to write a post about your first and second worst?

Perhaps, I will but those two stories are just negative. I’d rather write about funny. But maybe I will one day.

By the way, did you know that Sunny Brook Whiskey isn’t actually whiskey? It’s really vodka flavored whiskey. And if you’ve never heard of Sunny Brook: Don’t feel bad. Don’t google it. Just move on with your day and don’t look back.

Did you notice that one guy’s facial expression in the club picture?