Word of the Day I pick a random word from the dictionary and then write about it.

 Noun; 1. In English history a) the chief officer of a town or district b) the overseer of a manor; steward 2. The elected head of a town council in certain Canadian provinces

If I were given the rights/land/gullible people to create my own town right now, I would call the town “Funstop.” That way, people passing by it on the highway would stop there for fun. It would be a population of 5,000 people- roughly the size of a high school or a small liberal arts college. This is what “Funstop” would be like:

-Like a high school or small liberal arts college, “Funstop” would have a town quad. The town quad would be the center of any festivities or fairs. Also, there would be a log flume ride.

-When people broke a law, they would be publicly humiliated in the town quad through the following ways: having pies thrown at them, reading aloud their diary, showing their dick, getting yelled at by their mom, getting kicked by kids.

-There are no banks in Funstop.

-In the town park, there is a playground that has 2 sets of equipment: one is for ages 1-10, and the rest is for adults! Full sized slides, full sized swings, etc!

-The laws of funstop: Don’t hurt other people, No usage of the word “totes” or “fierce” (except when describing tigers), No stealing/cheating, No standing on the log flume ride

-The town mayor (me) gets to check in with every single citizen at least once every 3 months for a “How are you feeling?” meeting.

-24 hour breakfast food restaurant.

-The community theater is named “The Kelsey Grammar Theater for Re-Enactments of Frasier Episodes.” 

-Mandatory tap dance lessons (unless you have no legs)

-People with no legs get their own parade every year through the town quad.

1. Noun; The act or fact of failing, or falling short, losing strength, breaking down, going bankrupt, not doing or succeeding

My whole life, I’ve been terrified of failure. I’ve been terrified of every single failure I’ve ever had, large or small. I’ve been terrified of large and small failures because any failure could be the catalyst for the ultimate failure, which is an unfulfilled life. Each failure could lead to old Rachel on her deathbed going “What a waste this all was.” Every rejection by a boy was a sign that I was going to be alone forever. Every bad grade on a paper meant I had lost my intelligence, like one loses a pen.  When I got caught skipping chemistry class sophomore year and my drama teacher told my parents, that seemed like a boarding pass to a crackhouse.

I think about time travel way more than I should. A few weeks ago I posed this question to my boyfriend: “If I woke up tomorrow and I was 11 years old and it was 1998, would you still have the same cell phone number you have now or would I have to find a phone book to contact you at your house in Long Island and tell you that I’m your future girlfriend stuck in a time puzzle?” Of all the time travel things I obsess about, though, is the question of what I would tell myself if I could go back and give myself one piece of advice. And really, if I were talking to myself before age 18, I would say, “Any failure at this age doesn’t actually matter.” 

When I was in first grade, I was on the soccer field playing a game with my friends. I had invented the rules of the game, but nobody was listening to me. To get people’s attention, I shouted, “If you guys don’t quiet down right now I’m going to pull my pants down!” When no one quieted down, I tugged on my pants a little just to show them I meant business. And then, my pants fell down. I was mortified. Everybody saw my ass. Now, this was 1993, so I was wearing a fantastic pair of beige culottes that fit comfortably around my waist. Note about culottes: if you tug on culottes, they’re going to fall down. I was so embarrassed at the realization I just pulled my own pants down, though, I immediately screamed, “Who pulled my pants down?!” 

Thus, the schoolwide search began for the culprit who pulled down Rachel Bloom’s pants. After all, this was a serious sexual offense. The principal interviewed everybody who was on the playground that day to determine who might have snuck up behind me and pulled down my pants. I remember her taking students, one by one, into a separate interrogation room. Finally, my first grade teacher took me into the room by myself. 

“Rachel. After much investigation, we have come to the conclusion that you pulled your own pants down.”

“OK.”

“Now, the principal went to a lot of trouble to interview all those people.”

“I know.”

“Don’t you think you deserve a star off?”

GASP. 

On the front of our pencil cases, each of us had a 5” x 7” index card with our name written on it and 4 stars. If we were bad, we got a star off. Now, I NEVER had any stars taken away. Stars off meant you were a bad kid, and I wasn’t a bad kid. So when my first grade teacher posed the idea that I, Rachel Bloom, deserved a star off, I went into panic mode. 

Star off means I’m a bad kid which means I’m the type of kid who says “damn” and uses their middle finger and the only kids who do that are kids whose parents are divorced oh my god my parents are going to get divorced and it’s all my fault and I’ll be so upset that I’ll never get into Yale or become a ballet teacher or a famous actress. 

“Don’t you think you deserve a star off?”

“No.”

And with that, my first grade teacher gave me a disappointed stare and told me to go back to my seat. I left the first grade with all four stars still intact. 

1. Noun; A connoisseur of fine food and drink; epicure

2. Adjective; of or characteristic of a gourmet, esp. in involving or purporting to involve high- quality or exotic ingredients and skilled preparation

Welcome to the only Chuck-E-Cheese that is a formal dining room with a fixed price menu. Our menu:

3 Courses: $80.00

6 Course Tasting Menu: $115.00

Coloring Books Available Upon Request.

Appetizers:

Cheesy Bread with Foie Gras

Buffalo Wings with Creme Fraiche

French Fries Wrapped in Pancetta with Black Pepper Sauce

Main Courses:

Gourmet Super Combo Pizza with Bacon (Slowly Cooked for 2 Months on a Wooden Grill), Prime Rib, Mushrooms, 5 kinds of cheeses

Barbecue Chicken Pizza with Rosemary Crusted Chicken, Gourmet Barbecue Sauce, Duck Confit and Rare Green Peppers from the Mountains of Venezuela

Spaghetti and Meatballs (All Pasta is Handmade in Italy and Shaped Like Chuck E. Cheese Himself!!!)

Desserts:

Apple Cobbler Pizza with Apples Over Frangipane, Fresh Berries and Blueberry Compote

Cinnamon Sticks Topped with Gold Leaf and Served With Tahitian Vanilla Ice Cream

Note: Playing Under the Table Is Acceptable Between Courses.

adj. not in conformity with accepted principles of right behavior; wicked; sometimes, specif., unchaste; lewd

Today was a day that I put picked a random spot in the dictionary and just picked a word. And ho! What a word!

This word is heavily grounded in religion to me. “Morality” is commonly seen as a quality that gets us points with the higher ups. It’s a gold star. Student of the Month. Practicing “Immorality” docks us points and we have to sit in the corner and get an “N” in citizenship…for eternity.

I once dated this dude in high school who was super Christian. Or he claimed to be. He went to church, talked about Jesus a fair amount and was obsessed with literature that dealt with the the moral questions behind our choices. Maybe this last trait was because, in contrast to his faith, he was on a constant campaign to get me to have sex with him. At the time, I was a virgin and pretty scared of sex. But, I was kind of in love with this dude, so I put up with some of his shit. One time, he started with the dirty talk. He was texting me on his phone while I was on AOL instant messenger. I didn’t want to waste money on so many text messages. They’re expensive when you’re not on an unlimited plan!

So here’s me, the non-religious person who is totally uncomfortable and weirded out by the dirty talk coming from this incredibly devout dude.

This is basically how the conversation went:

Devoutguy: I could make you feel really good, Rachel

me: Uh…

Devoutguy: Come on. My hands slipping down your shirt…I can’t wait to taste you…

Me: Hmm, I dunno.

Devoutguy: What are you wearing? I hope it’s nothing….

Me: Ya know….the usual. PJs and stuff. Eating ice cream. Watching “The Fairly Oddparents.” Do you like that show?

Devoutguy: I want your pussy

Me: ok

End of conversation.

Was his act of making me feel uncomfortable “immoral?” Maybe. Or maybe he was so judgmental of his natural desires that when those impulses finally came out it was in intense bursts of repressed aggression. See? This is what I’m good at. I’m good at justifying it when people are dicks to me. I see everything in such a gray area, very rarely do I grow balls and lash out at someone. To me, “immorality” and “morality” are so blended, I am too scared to defend myself for fear of offending the poor soul who is sending me dirty texts. Maybe if I were more Biblically minded, I would have given this guy the punishment he deserved and told him to fuck off.

adj.

1. Of the world; esp., worldly, as distinguished from heavenly, spiritual, etc.

2. Commonplace; everyday; ordinary

INT. AN APARTMENT IN BROOKLYN- NIGHT

ALIEN beams himself into the room of RACHEL

ALIEN: Greetings, Rachel!

RACHEL: Aahhh! What the fuck?! What the fuck?!

ALIEN: Do not be alarmed. I’m not going to hurt you.

RACHEL: Ahhh! Holy fuck! Holy fuck!

ALIEN: Please stop hitting me with that stapler. You’re wasting your energy, as I cannot feel pain.

RACHEL: Wow. An alien. This has extreme spiritual repercussions for me. After this experience, I’m going to have to rethink everything I’ve ever-

ALIEN: Shut up and just live in the moment. Listen, I’ve come from across the universe to interview a random human. And that human is you.

RACHEL: Wow! I’m honored!

ALIEN: Good. So tell me, Rachel…what is your place in this world?

RACHEL: Well, I’m a recent college graduate, and I wanna do comedy, it’s a long story what comedy is-

ALIEN: No no, I know what comedy is. On my planet, we love “The Jeffersons.”

RACHEL: Oh cool.

ALIEN: By your place, I mean what skills do you exchange to make a living? To buy material goods?

RACHEL: Ohh. You mean…what’s my job.

ALIEN: Yes! Job! I remember that word from “The Jeffersons.” So what do you contribute to the world in exchange for goods? Do you help the sick and needy? Do you help build new and exciting technology?

RACHEL: No…I work in a restaurant.

ALIEN: What is “restaurant?”

RACHEL: It’s a place that sells food.

ALIEN: What is “food?”

RACHEL: You know what “job” is, but you don’t know what “food is?”

ALIEN: Stop your insolence or I will release the deadly alien disease in this glass tube!

RACHEL: Ahh! OK. Food is…the stuff we convert to energy, and what we don’t use we convert into waste.

ALIEN: Ah.

RACHEL: So anyway, I work at a place that sells an energy source. But our restaurant is more expensive because our energy source is better than others.

ALIEN: Why, does your energy source give magic powers?

RACHEL: No. Because it is more pleasurable to the tastebuds.

ALIEN: What must one exchange to obtain your restaurant’s energy source?

RACHEL: If you want dinner, it’s going to cost 98 dollars per person for 3 courses. These courses are a beginning, small energy source portion, then a larger energy source portion, then a sweeter energy source portion.

ALIEN: Whoa! Pricey!

RACHEL: Well, it also has a really good view. I mean- uh- it is an opportune place to consume energy while gazing on a pleasing sight.

ALIEN: So how does this help society?

RACHEL: Well…people in our society who have more money than other people come here a lot.

ALIEN: Ahh…people who have “moved on up to the eastside?”

RACHEL: Yes. Exactly.

ALIEN: So it’s only those people?

RACHEL: No no. It’s also a place to get an energy source for special occasions. Like when a man decides to mate with a woman for life. He often proposes his life plan at my restaurant. He puts a shiny gem from the earth on her finger.

ALIEN: That sounds like a good cause. You make people good food in a beautiful place!

RACHEL: Well…I don’t have anything to do with the actual food. Or the actual dining. See, I sit at a desk in front of the restaurant and I greet people.

ALIEN: Greet?

RACHEL: You know…I say hello. Ask them if they’d like to see a menu.

ALIEN: Wouldn’t the same thing be accomplished if you taped a menu on the door?

RACHEL…yeah.

ALIEN: So what else?

RACHEL: I also lend men suit jackets.

ALIEN: Why?

RACHEL: Since our restaurant has a more expensive energy source and a pretty gazing area, people have to dress better.

ALIEN: Why?

RACHEL: Because it’s a fancy restaurant.

ALIEN: That sounds stupid.

RACHEL: You’re stupid.

ALIEN: Look at us, we are just like George and Florence! So that is what you do? You tell people they are in a restaurant they already knew they were in, and deny people energy sources based on the material draped on their body?

RACHEL: I also make people give us their credit card numbers so they can confirm a reservation to eat the energy source. If they don’t send us a fax with their credit card number, we get rid of the reservation. It makes them sad.

ALIEN: Why must it be such an elaborate process just to convert energy into waste?

RACHEL: I don’t know.

ALIEN: Do you at least make enough money to buy yourself goods?

RACHEL: It’s enough.

ALIEN: Well. I’ve learned a lot.

RACHEL: Really?

ALIEN: Yes. I understand. I am often forced to answer the blargaphone on the space ship and shine the captain’s shoes.

RACHEL: That sounds like it sucks.

ALIEN: Yep. It kinda does.

RACHEL: Do you want to watch tv?

ALIEN: Do you have Nick at Nite?

1. A wanderer

2. A traveler to a shrine or holy place

3. [P-] Any member of the band of English Puritans who founded Plymouth Colony in 1620

OK, so sometimes the words I pick for this blog won’t be totally spontaneous. Last time, I flipped through the dictionary with my eyes closed and landed on a word at random. I started this current blog post on Thanksgiving, and it only felt appropriate to choose a holiday word. I had to go to work before I could finish this entry, so I had a little extra time to think about this sci-fi short story. So here it is.

THE PILGRIM

Abraham Lincoln was lost. Fuming and red-faced from hiking, he threw down his compass. Piece of old world shit. If only his GPS hadn’t been confiscated in The Great Burn, he’d be there by now. A science nerd in school and laughably bad at athletics, Abraham had never been used to much physical activity, so this 2 day hike was really taking it out of him. Abey (that’s what his girlfriend called him and it stuck with everyone else) sat on a log covered in ants, and, after a sickly sigh, took out his last cigarette. For all he knew, this was the last cigarette on earth. Or the last cigarette that wasn’t filled with cotton.

No one knew why cotton got The Creatures high. For that matter, no one knew what kind of high cotton produced in The Creatures. It’s hard to judge emotion of any being whose face is covered in 37 mouths.  A lot of people argued that The Creatures didn’t feel anything; that all they wanted was to consume, feed, feed, feed until (God willing) they’d all burst from gluttony. It was said, though, that if you were being judged in front of one of their panels and the Chief started to smoke cotton, you’d be let off with a warning and a spear in the leg. Maybe cotton produced a calm, merciful high.

Abey felt like a failure. What a mockery that his parents named him after one of the greatest Americans who ever lived. At first, he thought it was a sign: maybe he’d be the one to start the resistance! Two weeks ago, his job in the propaganda paper route finally paid off: sneaking tiny fliers into the green pages, Abraham Lincoln organized a starting place for the first battle. By contacting other paper boys he’d met at the paper boy boot camps, Abey got the fliers stuffed into every newspaper north of Connecticut within two weeks. Abey had a plan, he just needed enough people to be in one place at one time. People were hailing him with furtive, hissing whispers up and down New England.  Abraham Lincoln the Second! The second great emancipator! But how could he free the humans if he couldn’t even find the fucking meeting place? And if he was lost, what about the other thousands of people who had been attempting to go unnoticed through the woods?

Abey heard leaves being crushed by a heavy foot. He braced himself and held tight onto his bulging potato sack. It was a Creature.

“What are you doing here?!” The Creature’s many mouths made his voice a frighteningly booming bass; it sounded like when the volume is turned up way too loud for one of those announcements at a movie theater telling people to please refrain from talking. Everyone in the theater shuts their ears and goes, “What the fuck?!”

Abraham started to answer The Creature’s question while slowly untying his rucksack. “I’ve been exiled to wander by a Chief. Here, I’ll show you my wandering papers.” Abey could see The Creature breathing in his lie through the mouths. Hopefully The Creature would interpret Abey’s electric brain signals as nervousness and not dishonesty. All Abey needed was 15 seconds to find the Bic lighter buried deep within the potato sack filled with cotton.

“I don’t believe you! I am sensing a lie coming from your beak! Fucking piece of shit human!” cried The Creature. He put an arrow in his bow and tasted where Abey’s heart was. “You’re a lying hu…..hu…..”

The Creature sat down, bathing in the smoke like it was in a sauna. In the moment The Creature drew his bow and arrow, Abey found 3 seconds to flick the lighter and set the bushel of cotton on fire. He was almost glad he got caught in the woods; this was the only true test of the resistance’s weapon before they went into battle. Abey’s hypothesis was that, since the highly sensitive mouths of the creatures were 500% more sensitive than that of a human, they would also be more affected by drugs than humans. Thus, if a large amount of cotton was burned around The Creatures, perhaps they’d get so high they’d be vulnerable to attack. Abey’s plan was to smoke The Creatures out.

The creature was now laying down and singing “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad” in a demonic baritone. He was drawing listlessly through the air with his 20 fingers, flickering his metallic nails like he was in the finale of a Broadway musical.

“How do you feel?” asked Abey.

“Like…like everything is going to be all right with everything. Look. I’m drawing a pyramid. It’s in Egypt, and here’s a picture of a Pharoah on it, and gold-” Abey stabbed him right through the heart with a kitchen knife. The Creature oozed blue blood. The fact that The Creatures were literally “blue blooded” was an obnoxious pun The Creatures loved and wore on funny t-shirts.

Abey watched the creature take his last shuddering breath and picked up the compass. It was pointing to the right. Abey felt a burst of mental energy. He suddenly knew where he was going. Headed left, Abey ran for 30 minutes until he heard a deep rumble. Fearing it was a Creature, Abey flattened himself to the ground. Listening harder, though, he realized the rumbling was not the voice of one Creature, but the voices of many humans. Abey followed the sound a parted a space in the bushes.

About 2,000 people were standing on a beach, each holding masses of cotton. The Creatures were idiots to never patrol the coasts. They figured any human who tried to escape would drown and the world would be better off. Never did any of them consider it would be a meeting place.

Abey’s girlfriend, Regina, saw him first. “Look! It’s Abey! Everyone shut up!” The crown parted for the lanky 17 year-old.  Kissing Regina, he stood on a box someone had set up for him. He cleared his throat and began the speech he’d been practicing. It was kind of a rip-off of Bill Pullman’s speech in “Independence Day,” but Abey could think of nothing more appropriate to this situation than the movie “Independence Day.”

“Today is the dawning of a new America. An America where every human being has the right to his or her own pursuit of happiness, regardless of race, religion or species. Thank you for meeting me here in Plymouth. Now it begins.”

1. Declining; making or becoming worse; said of a word whose basic meaning has changed for the worse (Ex: cretin)

2. disparaging or derogatory- n. a pejorative word or form

So my first word is a word that defines words. Cool.

I like that the example in the dictionary of an insulting word is “cretin.” My dictionary was published in 1982. Was that even still an insult back then? I don’t know if anyone has used the term “cretin” to be scathing since a Rockefeller used it against a flapper who had just thrown up in his birdbath. I feel like “cretin” is one of those words to dust off when you want to both lightly insult someone and also get laughs. It’s so forgotten, it’s almost a compliment.

My favorite compliment ever is the word “gorgeous.” The first time I was called “gorgeous,” I almost cried. I was waiting to leave in a limo for prom my freshman year of high school, and we were all meeting at my friend Lars’ house. My prom date came up the stairs, saw me in my ringlets and strapless gown, and said, “You look gorgeous.” I melted. And then we went to the Long Beach Aquarium, danced under the jellyfish, and it was magical.

Nowadays, some words have quickly gone from insults to compliments. Look at the obvious example of the word “Geek.” If you were called a geek in high school say, 20 years ago, it was an insulting word that connoted weird clothes, huge glasses and such a fervent interest in something smart it gave one blinders to normal social interaction. Now the word “geek” has grown an allure and, amazingly, has the same connotation: weird clothes, huge glasses and such a fervent interest in something you have blinders to social protocol. It is suddenly adorable to be bumbling, not know what to do with your hands, and have pigeon toes. Wonderfully, I didn’t have to change with the world; the world changed with me.

Other words that can be positive: “sick,” “wicked,” and “retarded.” Unless the Black Eyed Peas were describing a mixer for the mentally challenged, that song is saying that tonight, they are going to get so drunk and crazy they’ll be retarded.

Will some words ever be OK to use in a positive-ish light? I don’t think the word “cunt” ever will. Sometimes I’ll playfully call my friends words like “Poopface” or “Stupidface” (my secret: end everything with “face.” That’s between you and me.) I have very few girl friends, though, who would be cool with me playfully saying, “Hey cunt” or even “Hey cuntface.” It’s a gross- sounding word. There’s something about those harsh consonants sandwiching a gutteral “uh” that makes most women turn uber feminist. Some women keep saying that we should take back that word, but did we ever have it in the first place? Do we even want it back? It’s gross.

So what will be the compliments of my daughter’s generation? (Let’s call my future daughter Ainsley, because I really like that name). When my daughter is going to her first prom, and she’s in a beautiful gown, and the boy of her dreams comes up the stairs and sees her, will he say, “You look like a cunt, Ainsley”? And will Ainsley go doe-eyed, fall into his arms and wait to be swept away to the Long Beach Aquarium? Or will she slap him in the face and say, “You’re such a cretin!”?

The earliest wisdom imparted from my parents I can remember is the phrase, “Keep your hands to yourself.” However, no matter how many times I was told this, I rarely kept my hands to myself. My hedonistic little fingers loved touching people; playing with their hair, writing my name on their arms by digging my fingers into their skin, wiping snot on their backpacks, etc. I was notorious in the first grade for chasing boys around with my lips pursed; this action earned me the notorious nickname, “The Kissy Girl.” It’s kind of weird that I was feared for my horrifying 6 year-old sexual appetite, but this nickname was definitely preferable to later peer-given monikers like “Crazyshit” or “EthelMermanwannabecunt.”

The 2nd to earliest wisdom imparted by my parents I can remember is this phrase: “Look it up in the dictionary.” Unlike the “keep your hands to yourself” rule, I always honored this direction. I love looking up words. I love getting definite answers to a question. If I think about it, it’s the closest thing to God that I have, especially because my childhood dictionary occupied its own altar-like table. To see a word in its purest form makes that word wholly yours, and I learned this early on. ‘Cause when you’re a kid and you ask another kid the meaning of a word, that kid is either wrong or lying. When I was 4, a classmate told me that the word “month” was a synonym for the word “year,” and I believed it for a long time, until my friend Samantha told me she was moving away for four years and I scoffed and said, “4 years? So you’ll just be gone for summer! Why are you crying?” (To be fair, I was a really gullible kid. I spent half a year at Hebrew school digging a giant hole in the sand during playtime because this girl Amanda told me there was a mall made by Martians underground and we’d go down there and get awesome alien candy and body glitter.) So I’ve always looked things up in the dictionary.

For this blog, I’m basically going to find a random word in the dictionary and then write about it. It’s as simple as that. If nothing else, it’s a good excuse to extend my vocabulary. So, unscrupulously I shall forge my way through this murky quagmire that can be as dangerous as hypophosphorous acid (noun; a monobase acid of phosphorus, H3PO2; it is a strong reducing agent).