Courtney Enlow

… in the night. While you sleep.

As part what is now an ongoing educational series for Outside of the In-Crowd, there is a new Ebola in town. And this time, it’s personal. In fact, this infestation is so terrifying that I couldn’t even bring myself to make the title “Wedding Ebola 2: Electric Boogaloo” and lord knows I seek out ways to inject that into my sentences at least twice daily. Because I don’t want to associate something wonderful with something horrifying.

Yes, babies. EVERYWHERE. And I am not being remotely over the top when I say that they will kill us all. Oh yes. Did you see It’s Alive? Yeah it’s going to be a lot like that, I’m certain.

As you can see, I have a slight phobia. Not of babies themselves, really. I love babies. Babies are super. I myself have known many. I have a younger brother who was a baby for awhile, and roughly four hundred cousins, all of whom were babies. Some of them still are even, and I love each and every one of them. No, babies themselves are not the issue here.

It’s the having them.

Look, I don’t know if you know much about childbirth, but even its Wikipedia page is straight up nightmare juice. It’s like a novelization of Texas Chainsaw. It involves blood and fluids and rippings and tearings and engorgements and it’s all very John Hurt and I don’t like it.

You know what else is scary? Fetuses. Even before they come out they’re terrifying. They look like the star-child at the end of 2001. And the doctors take their picture and they don’t look at the sono-cam (not its technical name probably). I don’t trust people who don’t look at the camera when you take their photo. It makes them look like they’re plotting. They’re plotting parasites that live in your body, eat your food, make you fat, turn your breasts into cartoonishly giant milk kegs and I’m not certain that they can’t hear your thoughts.

And once their born, they take over your life. They cry and refuse to sleep normal human Earth hours. And you have to teach them how to be people. That’s scary. I’m not even sure how to be a person, I can’t teach a tiny creature to be human too; I’m not equipped.

You’re screwed either way. If you have a girl-baby, it could grow up to be a slut, then you’d have to lock it up till its 40. If you have a boy-baby, it could be a cheating pig bastard, then you’d have to lock it up till it’s 40. Either way, you’ll have to invest in home design that includes at least two small dungeon-type rooms with reasonable access to sunlight and cable, and in these harsh economic times, who can afford that?

You’d think all these things would frighten any thinking woman enough to get her biological clock surgically removed. But apparently it doesn’t. And the menfolk are no help, as they apparently lack the cognitive ability to think of anything beyond “tiny replica of self who will play football and replace all ‘r’ sounds with ‘w’ until an acceptable age, which is cute and awesome.”

I don’t think it’s awesome. I think it’s a tiny punishment for bad dirty sexual intercourse that will ruin my life and force me to stop swearing with reckless abandon.

So you’ll see, I’m not so much ready for the motherhood. But apparently, everyone else in the world is. Nearly every celebrity is pregnant right now, and the ones that aren’t are under constant “baby bump” scrutiny every time they eat a quesadilla or miss a coke bump. A few Facebook friends have recently acquired sonogram pictures as their default (which I find akin to posting a picture of a routine dental x-ray, but hey, I don’t really have a soul). And those people I wrote about last time, the ones getting engaged and all that, they’ll probably be having babies before too long. It’s just too much.

When I think of babies, I think of loss. Loss of all the stuff I like to do (ie: watch television without being bothered) and loss of getting to hang out with my friends doing what we like to do (ie: watching Fear or The Crush and drinking wine without being bothered). I don’t want any part of that craziness.

But then I pass by Baby Gap. And bad things happen. Bad ovarian things and warmth and a facial contortion into an expression that can only be described by the words “awwww der li-uhl babieshh” and a very VERY slight and subtle longing that exists just enough to strike a diapered arrow of fear into my very soul.

My God. It’s started, hasn’t it?

This does not bode well for any of us.

Courtney Enlow is a writer living in Chicago and working as a corporate shill to pay the bills. You can contact her at courtney@hobotrashcan.com.

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Courtney Enlow

Let’s be honest about one thing right now. For the past two or three months, I’ve done pretty much nothing but watch political coverage and I’ve generally talked or thought about precious little besides Barack Obama. Now that this has all come to fruition, I literally don’t know what to do with myself.

I haven’t seen many new movies in the last two months (save for Saw 5, obviously, because as long as they keep making those shitshows, I will keep seeing them) and my Netflix queue is probably starting to feel a bit scared that they will never make it off the list and into my living room. I’d run out of my favorite tea weeks ago, but for reasons no longer clear to me, I could never make it to the tea shop at State and Division, most likely because I had to get home for Maddow. I was a woman consumed.

But now that it’s setting in, now that the Great Facebook Status War of 2008 has pretty much subsided, I’ve been able to look around at the three sad flaccid red and white Netflix envelopes that haven’t moved since September, at the empty tea pouches still sitting in my cupboard and at the hardwood floor that’s only received two sweeps with the Swiffer vacuum in the last month (and if you know me at all, you know that this is a worrying and terrifying fact). And I am proud to say, I am a woman reborn. As Barack Obama said “yes we can” and won his place in history, I shall say “yes I can” and leave my apartment for more than just spinach, vegan chili and Mint Milanos, which I’ve been living on for two months now and have actually gained weight (ten pounds of hope if you ask me). I’m going out in the world. I’m going to Anthropologie and buying myself a ridiculously expensive cardigan, I’m going to get a haircut and most importantly, I’m getting a new mission in life. And that mission, is Rick Moranis.

This past weekend, I watched Ghostbusters. I discovered a common phenomenon, surrounding this film and films like it; when a movie is so classic and so beloved and just regarded as one of your favorite movies of all time, then suddenly you realize you haven’t actually seen it in ten years. I personally hadn’t watched all of Ghostbusters in one sitting since my freshman year of high school (though, thanks to Comedy Central, I’ve watched its sequel maybe a hundred times). My friends and I followed it up with Spaceballs, a film which not unlike BASEketball, I can’t decide if I love it because of or in spite of how dumb it is. And in both of those viewings, one thing became incredibly apparent: Rick Moranis is a GOD (and I bet if Gozer asked him, he’d say YES, Ray).

The oeuvre of one Mr. Rick Moranis is, to put it rather esoterically, a magical romp through sunshine and lilies. Getting his start in SCTV and its recurring character spinoff movie Strange Brew, Moranis established himself, as critics have called him, one funny fucking Canuck, eh. He followed that up with a number of flicks, including those which so owned my childhood, the aforementioned Ghostbusters and Spaceballs and Little Shop of Horrors. I blame Little Shop for my longstanding geek fetish, which in a nice ironic turn stirs up jealousy and rage in my former frat boy football player boyfriend (score one in the geek column). These list of winners all culminated in the champion of my youth, the greatest sciencey-type film of all time, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids.

Oh that movie had everything. It had built-in future theme park potential (and mom and dad, I am still bitter that I never got to go), it had a nice teen love story, it had parent-child dynamics, it had possible divorce, which, not unlike the abortion plotline in Dirty Dancing, totally went right the hell over my head as a child, it had children nearly getting mutilated by a lawnmower, it had a sad ant death, EVERYTHING. It also had the sister’s really hot scrunched-socks-pulled-up-over-the-pants look that I rocked for years.

It also had a sequel, the sequel starred Keri Russell, she played Felicity, and last night I had a really graphic childbirth dream wherein I named the child Felicity. COINCIDENCE? I think not.

Rick Moranis has all but retired, following the death of his wife. Also, he has stated that he feels he has simply made enough money and doesn’t need to act anymore (if only half of Hollywood would follow suit). This is noble and all, and lord knows I’d love to have made enough money where I can just say “yeah, over it, I’m just going to hang out and ice fish” (and preferably I’d like to do this by 30). And I respect a man who gives it all up to be a full-time dad to his kids, occasionally writing an op-ed for NYT here and there. But Rick, buddy, we need you. The Ghostbusters videogame needs you. I’m pretty sure Zuul probably still needs you.

So people, it’s time to make this happen. Our previous efforts put Steve Guttenberg back in the public consciousness. If we can do that, we can do anything.

God bless us, everyone.

Courtney Enlow is a writer living in Chicago and working as a corporate shill to pay the bills. You can contact her at courtney@hobotrashcan.com.

Courtney Enlow

Man this shitshow’s been going on for a long time, amirite?

I was a child when this all started. And now, I am a bitter jaded old hag. Ayers, ACORN, abortion rights, Alaska (to be said “Alayaska”), al Qaeda (to rarely, if ever, be mentioned by the people who actually want us to stay in the damn war) and that’s just the A’s. And only a few of them at that.

I could tell you how much I’ve learned this election year. How I naively thought racism wasn’t as prevalent as it used to be and how unfortunately I’ve learned otherwise. How stupid and close-minded I’ve discovered people can be. Just how volatile people can become about their political leanings and just how hard people can cling to, as Obama so correctly said, “God and guns.”

But that would be depressing. I don’t want to be depressing. I want to be educational. I want, if nothing else, for you to get your learn on. That is why I’ve chosen to take this time to teach you something. And that something? Whether or not you are allowed to vote.

Look, I’ve read the Constitution (most of it … many parts) and I know that if you are over 18 years old and a US citizen and are registered, you are allowed to vote. That said, I’m not the Constitution and I have developed some rules for any and all party affiliations that I think can really help get the election cycle streamlined.

You are not allowed to vote if …

1. You are not registered

Easy and obvious enough. That said, this one goes a bit deeper, as I have also decided that if you are not registered, you are additionally no longer allowed to say things or have opinions because yours probably don’t matter.

2. You are only voting for someone because someone else is

Let me explain. Something I’ve sadly noticed in the past few years is the phenomenon of people having very strong feelings toward a party or candidate which are entirely based on other people’s opinions. And these feelings are not based upon the opinions of educated journalists or political figures. Rather, these opinions are entirely based upon significant others or parents. And it’s not gender-specific, it happens to both, but it bothers me most when it’s women. LADIES. You are ruining the movement and I will quickly and forcibly movement my hand across your face. Get out of the kitchen, put down the iron and get into 2008.

3. You believe Obama is a Muslim (or the anti-Christ, but so help me, I cannot let myself believe there’s many of those out there)

There was a study done recently that found people who identify as more politically conservative tend to hold stronger to lies after they’ve been debunked. I’m not saying I necessarily agree, I’m just saying. Using that logic, it makes sense that there are still a number of people out there who will not let go of this whole Muslim thing. Now A) you cannot have both the Rev. Wright argument and the Muslim thing. IT DOESN’T MAKE SENSE. And B) you’re a fucking racist. I hate to be the one to have to tell you, but it’s best you know now. I could go on and on about what Islam is really about and how there’s over a billion Muslims who are wonderful people and don’t fly planes into buildings and how there are just as many dangerous Christians as there are dangerous Muslims, but you’re probably really busy ironing your conical white mask and robes, so I’ll leave you be.

4. You only get your information from The Huffington Post

See? I’m so fair and balanced.

5. You get any of your information from Fox News

And there goes my balanced fairness. Damn you, Hannity!

6. You are only “liberal” in the sense that you like totally want weed legal, man

I believe it was Gandhi who once said “no [I don't smoke weed] because I’m not in seventh grade and I have things to do.” Gandhi was a great man.

…

I seem to have gotten Ghandi confused with Daniel Tosh. Again. It happens more than you think.

7. You are not allowed to vote if you have said at any point that someone who disagrees with your opinion is “drinking the Kool Aid.”

Because you’re a dick and unoriginal AND it’s pretty much not cool to compare someone’s opinion to a mass suicide AND AND AND! I like Kool Aid.

8. You are mourning the loss of David Tennant as The Doctor

For this, it’s not a matter of not being allowed to. It’s just I think that if I called in sick from voting, they’d understand. How can a person vote when they’re this devastated, I mean really? I spent a large part of this week watching 10th Doctor-era Who and sobbing hysterically.

But for Obama, I will emerge from my sadness and vote for change. I swear, when they make the movie about my struggle one day, you will be moved to fucking tears.

If you are none of the above (or at least for #8, if you can manage to lift yourself out of bed / your human-size pile of weepy snotty tissues and walk over to your nearest polling place), then I don’t care who you’re voting for. Just get out and vote. Because the only thing uglier than me after hours of sobbing over the loss of “my Doctor” is apathy.

Courtney Enlow is a writer living in Chicago and working as a corporate shill to pay the bills. You can contact her at courtney@hobotrashcan.com.

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Courtney Enlow

Ah Halloween. Strolling around the city, surrounded by happy smiling children of all ages, filled with candy and eyeliner and … What? Oh what’s this shit?

My buzzkill every Halloween since I was old enough to see adults celebrating this magical holiday: the slutty costume.

Not to go Ned Bitters all over your face, but what the hell is the matter with you? It’s fall, it’s cold, it’s a child’s favorite night of the year, and I have to look at your labia. You bitch.

I don’t think I ever really noticed the phenomenon until college when every October 31st, the streets of Chicago became inundated with slutty nurses, slutty pirate wenches, slutty cops, slutty bees, slutty referees, slutty Tom Cruise in Risky Business-es, slutty Alex DeLarges, et-fucking-cetera. All with cleavage up to their chins and more navel than a Florida orange grove.

I know what you’re thinking right now. Something along the lines of “killjoy” and “Amish” and if you’re one of the girls to whom I’m referring, probably the words “fat” and “jealous.” Well, no, asshole, and you’re the bitch for judging fat people. The words I’d go for are maybe “creative” or “dignified.” Or “not dumb.” We’ll go with that last one.

Seriously, I’m not fat. Don’t start with your emails again, Leia.

Look, I know that as women, we’re supposed to build each other up and be respectful, and not talk to each other using those horrible words that have kept us under the thumbs of a patriarchal society for generations. But you know what else helps us to remove ourselves from that position? Not showing your vagina to the whole world.

You can call it fun, you can call it having a good time, call it whatever you want. I have no problem with people posing nude for magazines or even doing porn, honestly. Because at the end of the day, they’re getting money to shake their berries. You might get a guy to take you home so you can drunkenly blow him. Dream big, slutty Alice in Wonderland, dream big.

And here is where we get to a fundamental reason why I am outside of this particular in-crowd as well. I do not understand the need to dress a certain way to get a guy to notice you.

(The in-crowd I’m referring to is obviously “anyone attracted to males.”)

I’m not naive. I know that looks matter to most people. I know that it’s just common understanding that everyone notices the outside before noticing the inside. That’s just how it goes. But while that may well be the case, I see no reason as to why a man needs to see your “inside” in that manner (that’s THREE vagina references so far, I am on a damn roll).

Of course when it comes down to it, my biggest problem with this tradition isn’t even the human flesh display that you become when you dress like that. It’s the lack of creativity. And here’s where we get to a fundamental problem with some female ladypeople. You don’t believe that you are interesting enough, so you try to display anything that makes you seem remotely intriguing to others, and more often than not, it’s the same thing everyone else is showing off.

This could be boobs, legs, a Coach bag, or whatever terribly uncomfortable and ugly new shoes are suddenly “in.” If you don’t have a personality to speak of, hell, just throw on your sunglasses with the giant DIORs on the side and grab your uglyass Louis Vuitton bag that you spent three grand on (when you could have bought an identical one on Mich Ave for nineteen bucks, but then you’d be sad AND a poser) and show that you’re RICH! and FABULOUS! and CARE ABOUT IMAGE! YAY VOGUE OMG REMEMBER WHEN CARRIE WORKED AT VOGUE OMG!

I guess you’re seeing the reason I’ve never had a huge number of female friends. Mainly just the select heinous bitches such as myself. In fairness, of course not all girls that dress provocatively at Halloween are slutty and sad. Of course not. Just the ones that wear the same old nurse and referee ones, I mean really, can’t you come up with ANYTHING else at all, really? See, I can’t even stop myself. It’s amazing I have friends, period.

I suppose I’ll have to just calm down and accept the fate of being forced to see all the skin coming my way in the next week. I will calm myself in the knowledge that while they are stumbling down the street in 40 degree weather dressed as slutty Palin, I am at least warmer.

Seriously, I’m not fat.

Courtney Enlow is a writer living in Chicago and working as a corporate shill to pay the bills. You can contact her at courtney@hobotrashcan.com.

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Courtney Enlow

* ahem *

My name is Courtney. And I’m an addict.

This isn’t some bait and switch annoying post where I say “I’m an addict. OMG shoes.” or “… to chocolate! OMG ovaries.” I have a serious problem, and frankly, it’s one that doesn’t get anywhere near the attention it so deserves.

I have a serious addiction to over the counter nasal spray.

Through my research via the Googles, I have found that this is a really common and damaging addiction. My understanding is that one doesn’t get addicted to the spray itself, per se, rather it’s healing properties. Here’s where I get foggy, but I’m pretty sure what happens next is that your nose begins to tighten like a vice-grip and you can no longer breath ever again and your sinuses just fill and fill and your head explodes and you die in a very graphic Scanners kind of scenario.

It started probably a year and a half ago. I’ve always had bad allergies, which combined with asthma equals bad news bears and further proof of what a fucking nerd I am. Needless to say, breathing has always been a bit of a challenge for me. When people say things like “it comes so natural, it’s like breathing” my response is generally BULLSHIT because no it doesn’t.

It all started with a single bottle of Fo … hey Joel, can we get sued for saying name-brands and associating them with badness? … ‘kay. So it all started with a single bottle of Number Direction Nasal Spray. (I almost went with Menage a Quatre nasal spray but decided against it. For the kids.) The leading name-brand nasal spray, the one that if this was Family Feud would ellicit a “survey says?” and the board would show a bazillionty percent, has never worked for me at all. NDNS, however? Holy shitsinuses Batman, it was miraculous. I could breathe through my nose for once. I could smell things. I could close my mouth without risking suffocation. It was beautiful.

Like with any drug, I started out just using here and there. Maybe every other day, daily during allergy season. No big whoop. Then my nose started doing the tighten-closing-Scanners-AHHshit-explosion thing and I had to increase frequency. At my peak, I was using every two hours every day, sometimes more. This includes night, which is why I haven’t had a full night’s sleep in a VERY long time. Almost two years, and I couldn’t breathe for more than 120 minutes without shooting chemicals into my nasal passages.

Not to be graphic, but I’m pretty sure the inside of my nose looks a lot like when Jeff Goldblum turned into BrundleFly.

I don’t tell you this to be all “let’s talk about me” or anything (who am I kidding, of COURSE I am) but rather to drop some damn science on you. No offense, HoTrash readership, but let’s face it - a lot of us probably have asthma and allergies around these here parts, which in our youth were often exacerbated by the big kids dropping your books and stealing your inhaler (like that twunty Casey from grade school. I WILL HAVE MY REVENGE, FUCKER.) So in all probability, you or someone you know has been affected by nasal spray dependence Scanners head explodey disease. Talk to your kids.

Anyway, a week ago, I decided to kick the habit cold turkey, and I’ve done so with only minor withdrawal symptoms. The first few nights were pretty miserable, but I got over it. It’s always the anticipation of not doing something anymore that psychs you out and scares you I think. Which is why I’ve decided to up the ante: I’m also quitting caffeine.

Oh, my friends, I do not intend to do this forever or completely. Eff that tired noise. But here’s the thing: my Starbucks order embarrasses literally everyone in earshot (I get regular black coffee when it’s warm, but as soon as it gets cold I can generally be found ordering things like a quad shot grande skinny hazelnut mocha, no whip, ah screw it, make it five shots.) I pretty much cut out soda after high school, mostly because cases of soda are really hard to carry home from the grocery store when you don’t have a car and live four long blocks from Jewel. But coffee and tea? I’d say I have two cups (and by “cups” I mean grandes or mediums depending on whether or not I want to bow to the Man) and then a cup of tea every night before bed. And then sometimes I’ll have three or four caffeinated mints. And lest we forget my ill-fated affair with Dexatrim back during Comic Con. Caffeine and I have had a long and volatile relationship, but I always come back to the sweet arms of my torrid lover, to be left shaking and jittery in its wake and then fall asleep at 9:30 unable to wake up at 6:30 the next morning.

I’ve never been addicted to “real” drugs. The aforementioned allergies and asthma (a.k.a., Nerd Flu) have precluded me from being a smoker (except for a few inebriato evenings and one week where I decided I was a deep brokenhearted artist), and I really don’t drink all that often (and when I do, I drink wine, a.k.a. Sleepy Juice. I don’t know how anyone has time to become a true wino when they’re sleeping the whole damn time.) I’ve never tried anything narcoticky, that shit sounds scary. So I guess that nasal spray and caffeine are my entire descent down the path of serious addiction.

Dammit I’m boring. Get out of my way, I’m getting some heroin.

Courtney Enlow is a writer living in Chicago and working as a corporate shill to pay the bills. You can contact her at courtney@hobotrashcan.com.

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