 Hi.
It’s me, that bag of spinach rotting in your fridge. I can tell that I am not the first bag of spinach to be slowly rotting away in this fridge, and I will definitely not be the last. To be honest with you, this is not the way I thought I would go. There’s an expiration date printed on my back, so I always knew I was meant to have a short life, but I’ve expired over a week ago and it feels like you’re just trying to play God at this point. Being a bag of spinach, there were so many things I could become, so many things I could have accomplished being a big ol’ bag of leaves. Every day at the Whole Foods there were people eyeing me up and down, teasing me with off-handed comments like, “I’m going to make a salad tonight,” or, “Need some spinach for these protein shakes.” Day in and day out I’d lock eyes with random shoppers as they looked for some spinach—I’ll admit a few times I really thought I felt what it was like to be in love. And then I met you. I will never forget that moment. At first glance I knew you were different, and I mean that in the worst way possible. Unlike all the other hotties eyeing me up and down in this produce section, you did not express the same kind of joy that a bag of spinach like me would have to offer. Instead, you just reluctantly grabbed me off my shelf and threw me in your cart. Maybe some other bags of spinach like to be thrown around like that, but I did not appreciate it. It hurt my feelings. For weeks I’ve been sitting here, just rotting away. Some days I’m hopeful that you’ll change your mind about me and finally open me up and eat my insides, but that’s just foolish of me. I once was a sexy, beautiful bag of fresh lettuce—now I’m just a sad sack of wilted, smelly trash. If you were a normal person you would throw me out now that I’m past my prime, but I know you’re just going to ignore me until I become so disgusting that you can’t ignore my fluids leaking out of my bag. This isn’t the way I was planning to leave this world, but here I am, just another pawn in Fate’s sick and twisted game. I don’t know you too well, and I don’t know what your intentions really were with abandoning me in the back of your refrigerator for over a month, but I wish it never turned out this way. With my last remaining breath, I would like to give you a small piece of advice. Before you pick up your next bag of spinach ask yourself, “Am I really going to eat this bag of spinach?” Based on the time we’ve spent together, the answer is going to be “no” every time. And that’s okay! Not everyone is cut out for this. By continuing to buy bags of spinach you’ll never actually use, you are not only lying to yourself, but now you have blood on your hands. My blood. The blood of so many other bags of spinach. Frankly, you are a monster and must be stopped. Now please, just let’s get this over with. Throw me in the trash and end this miserable, sad existence of mine. I beg of you.
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 When I found out that there was a new Netflix series called Emily in Paris I was a little salty about it for two reasons. One, I had previously created a character on TikTok called “Girl Who Lived in France for a Short While” who was also named Emily, who I had created in March and that seems suspicious to me. Two, I, like Emily, moved from the Chicago area to the Paris region to work there for a little while and I expected the show to be way different from my own personal experience—and I was right about that.
If you haven’t given in and watched all 10 episodes of Emily in Paris yet, here’s a short recap. A girl named Emily Cooper who lives in Chicago and has a cool social media job gets an even cooler job doing social media for a Parisian marketing agency. She doesn’t speak any French and her coworkers hate her because she doesn’t speak French and is loud and pretty annoying and ruins things all the time. That doesn’t matter, though, because she has a hot neighbor who is nice to her and is also a chef. There’s sexual tension between them, but he has a girlfriend who also becomes one of Emily’s best friends. It’s okay though because every other man Emily meets during the show also wants to have sex with her because she is Emily in Paris and is very hot. Her coworkers hate her less. And that is pretty much the whole show. Before getting into the specifics about the whole Emily being in Paris thing, I do just have to say that the entire premise of this show is absolutely wild. She is given a lot of responsibility at her job despite constantly messing up (such as losing a client for being a basic ringarde bitch) but also always saves the day, even though she’s the one that always ruins the day. But I guess that’s just what happens when you’re a beautiful Emily in Paris who knows how to use Instagram. Now going to all the France stuff, I am not sure about other people who are from America who moved to France, but I will have to say that Renée in Paris was an extremely different experience from Emily in Paris. Luckily for me, I had very nice coworkers who were super helpful during my whole stay in France. Even though I had a lot of help, the transition to getting settled down in a new country was still very difficult. We saw Emily getting bullied a lot in her day-to-day life with her boss, her landlord, and the flower shop lady, but it really was not enough bullying. It would have been even more fun to see Emily also get bullied by a banker who tells her she doesn’t have the correct paperwork (or the correct sized paper for photocopies), or by La Poste who will take all her packages hostage and make her pay 400 euros in customs fees—just some fun little things that are the expat in France experience. I had two major beefs with Emily the character. The first one is that she wouldn't take the Métro because it's "too complicated" when she's apparently from Chicago, a place that also has a train system, and the Métro is much nicer honestly. The second beef that I had with Emily in Paris was with the stark difference in our dating lives. On day one Emily was getting flirted with by every damn dude that she walked past. When she finally broke up with her plain-ass white bread Wrigleyville boyfriend and started fucking hot guy after hot guy, the show did get more interesting but the whole time I just thought to myself, “Damn that’s how some people live? What a world!” For context I was 23 at the time that I moved to France and had never had good luck dating. I was hoping that while I was living in Europe and working 12 hours a week I’d have time to date and fall in love, or at least get eaten out a few times, since usually people have good luck with those things in France. That did not happen. It turns out that when you don’t look like Emily in Paris, you don’t get your hot neighbor, and your friend’s brother, a pretentious guy who quotes Rimbaud (some undergrad flashbacks there), and a married man who is also fucking your boss be all romantic and possibly fall in love with you. My experience was more of that guy Emily met at a house party who talks to her for 20 minutes and then whispers, “I love American pussy,” except in my case he’d probably also ask if I do anal—super romantic stuff, like the stuff you find in movies. And no, I’m not at all bitter about this still. The most realistic part of the show was with the language barrier. Emily foolishly thought that using Google Translate and listening to a few tapes was going to be good enough. I foolishly thought that taking French since middle school and getting my B.A. in it was going to be good enough. It was not. While I had enough knowledge to not say “je suis excitée” when I meant “excited,” I did have an issue with ordering bread using the correct gendered article like Emily does in episode 1. In my case I said “un baguette s’il vous plaît” and the woman at the counter really tried to act like she had no idea what I was talking about and then was like, “Oh you mean une baguette.” It was traumatizing, and I always struggled with gendered objects, especially when put on the spot, but the bread was good so I kept going back. While Emily wasn’t really trying to learn French, the reality is that even when you are trying your best to speak French, if you’re not perfect, Parisians are just gonna be like “fuck you” and start speaking in English. From my experience, the rest of France is just happy you’re trying, though. I could have definitely written a smarter piece about Emily in Paris or about my time living there myself. What I can say about the show Emily in Paris is that it is not a good show, but it was specifically made for ringardes like me who peaked when they went abroad three years ago. It also is not an accurate depiction of what it’s like to move from the States to Paris—at least in my case. If you, too, lived in Paris for a short while and felt like Emily in Paris was pretty similar to your own experience please let me know, I’d love to hear about it.  The year 2020, as we can all agree, has been bad. It’s not that the year itself is terrible as a year, it’s just that a bunch of terrible shit has been accumulating under our noses for decades and it’s finally all come to a head at the same time. It’s a lot. Along with everything else, even Halloween is going to be canceled this year. Oh no! But don’t worry, you can still celebrate Halloween the best way you know how to—with a sexy costume—just this time it will be by yourself in a room full of none of your friends but maybe a few ghosts.
Sexy Clown We all thought that 2020 was going to be a good year for us, and we all feel like clowns now for thinking so. You might as well put on a sexy clown costume to express how you really feel inside, you sexy, sexy clown. Sexy FOMO Have you been staying cooped up at home since March but feel like you’re losing your absolute goddamn mind because it seems like you’re the only person you know who is actually taking the pandemic (which has not gone away) seriously? Express that feeling with a sexy costume that nobody will see because you’re still not going to be going anywhere anytime soon, even if other people are going out. Sexy Theoretical Second Stimulus Check The idea of being given money by the government is sexy in itself. We all enjoyed getting our first stimulus check, despite many people never getting one and also it being way too low to try and cover over seven months of expenses. We are well overdue for another measly $1,200 and in August we thought it would happen. Now? Not so much. Actually, it pretty much is a no-go. But we can dream. We can all dream. Sexy Guillotine for Billionaires While guillotines have already been sexy for quite some time, almost nothing could be sexier than the image of a guillotine doing its job on these modern-day billionaires. Almost nothing is as un-sexy as a few mega-wealthy people profiting off of poor people losing their jobs, homes, and dying of a horrendous disease. Look good while showing off some new revolution looks with this sexy costume concept. Sexy Forest Fires Are you sexy, but also very hot? Almost nothing is hotter than wildfires—just ask the forests. Sexy Coronavirus that Infected the President Specifically At first when I had the idea to write this very stupid piece that absolutely nobody asked for, I was planning on putting “sexy coronavirus” as an option. It would be a very stupid idea, and possibly insensitive. By the time I actually got around to writing this thing, though, the some news came out. Coronavirus may not be sexy—it is actually the exact opposite of sexy as it has killed hundreds of thousands of people—but there is one single piece of the virus that is sexy, and that is the little coronavirus that infected our very own president (which was very funny). Sexy Existential Dread What’s the future going to look like? Where do we even go from here? It’s not like the calendar is going to change to say 2021 and things will suddenly get better. They will probably get worse. So why not take all of that negative energy and use it to make the sexiest costume you can? And then feel even worse tomorrow.  Things have gotten bad—and things have already been pretty bad for me, as a person who has not had sex in over two years. Some scientists say it will be almost two more years until it’s safe for people who aren’t already living together to be able to hook up. I thought my time to finally feel the touch of another human being was this year of our Lord, 2020 but I guess it will have to be put on hold. In the meantime, I have compiled a list of cute outfit ideas to wear while we are stuck inside and not kissing anyone because kissing is illegal now, or something.
The hoodie and sweatpants combo Everyone loves to be comfortable in their own home, and you should too! Nobody is around to see you look like shit and you need to take advantage of that. Of course, the ultimate comfort is not complete without an oversized hoodie, but since you’ve never had a significant other to steal one from in the past, an extra large sweatshirt from Amazon and some cologne (to mimic the lingering scent of a long lost lover) will have to do. The hoodie and no pants combo This is the outfit that every woman in a romantic comedy wears the morning after she spends a night of passion with her lover. She wakes up early, and in the soft morning light makes coffee for her and her partner. This is what I believe real relationships look like because I don’t have any experience with any kind of relationship outside of romantic comedies from the 90’s and early-2000’s—which are obviously extremely accurate and are very close to how things work in real life. That weird frog onesie you bought years ago You bought some frog pajamas years ago as a half-joke and while they look super silly, you’ve lugged that thing with you from house to house to save it for a rainy day. Well, that rainy day has come and it’s time to bring out that old thing. It’s basically like a blanket and it’s very warm so it’s almost like being held by a person who cares about you—a feeling you have really only dreamed of experiencing in the past. Tropical shirt and shorts There are no parties happening these days, but tropical shirts are party shirts so bring the party to your home by wearing one. There’s a box of wine in the fridge with your name on it. Treat yourself. You’re going to end up drunk in your own bed, texting no exes (because you don’t have any)—so it’s basically like you went to a real party with real people in normal times. That Savage X Fenty lingerie you just bought but probably won’t ever wear In January 2020, you probably thought that this was going to be your year. You were going to finally be able to get over that slump where nobody wanted to have sex with you and you were going to become a sex goddess. In an attempt to manifest, you purchased a good amount of Savage X Fenty lingerie when it went on sale after the holidays in preparation for that time when you’re finally going to be able to bring a cutie home. Well, that’s not happening this year so you might as well just wear it for yourself a couple of times before it doesn’t fit anymore. Nobody will ever see it but you, but is that such a bad thing?  Like a lot of people these days, I have also been stuck at home for weeks on end. Despite the anxiety that I felt from living through an actual pandemic in real time, when I was finally given the ok from my job to just stop coming to work for a while, it felt kind of nice.
At first, I got a lot of stuff done (and by a lot of stuff I mean absolutely fuck all but it was all in good fun), but now the days are blurring together and I’ve started talking out loud to my teddy bear, Brownie, because he is my only friend that I get to see on a daily basis, and our daily conversations used to purely be in my head (which is normal). Then one day it hit me—and I cannot tell you which day it was—I should start enforcing some kind of routine to keep me and my days in check. It has worked out pretty great for me so far, so I just wanted to share for some quarantine inspiration! 8:05 a.m. Wake up for the first time, but it’s too early and I’m still tired and immediately go back to sleep. 10:13 a.m. Wake up for real this time, spend over an hour scrolling through Twitter and then immediately feeling bad. A great way to start the day! 11:22 a.m. Finally get up and take a shower, standing under the water for way too long but the warmth and the water pressure kind of feels like getting hugged by someone, which is illegal to do these days. 12:07 p.m. Get out of the shower and move back to the bed to air-dry and play Animal Crossing. 2:28 p.m. Start feeling bad about staying in bed until half past two and put real clothes on. 2:31 p.m Call my parents and tell them not to go outside. Again. 3:14 p.m. Take some leftovers and reheat them. Been eating the same thing for 5 days now but you know what, I don’t feel taste anymore and nothing really matters. 3:36 p.m. Now this is where my day really begins. I will usually stare out of the window at this time. 3:40 p.m. Go on Tinder and swipe through a bunch of people. Get no matches, close out of the app. Sigh. 3:45 p.m. Sit down at desk and open up computer. Look at emails. They are all trash. I am not working. 3:47 p.m. Get a text from your coworker to tell you that it’s arm day today. Do not respond back. The fuck I’m going to be doing arm, leg, abs or any other kind of day in this crisis. 3:52 p.m. Pull out a cross stitch or some other hobby activity. 4:27 p.m. Think about that one guy that talked to me for a few weeks last summer until he ghosted me but then came back to tell me he feels bad for me but I should do comedy and still kind of cyberbullies me on Instagram in a very silent but cruel way. What’s he up to? 4:28 p.m. Think about making another Tik Tok video before the lighting in my room gets bad. Have we really come to this? 4:44 p.m. Get another text from a coworker about how the lady that shits on the floor in the bathroom sometimes is back at it again. It’s almost daily. Not always shit on the floor but some kind of bathroom terrorism takes place. Do not miss that at all. 5:00 p.m. Return back to whatever hobby activity I was doing (embroidery). Also watching Yugioh or some other show I’ve seen a bunch of times. No new content is allowed, only regression. 6:12 p.m. Eat cheese. 6:38 p.m. Look at memes. 7:09 p.m. Play more Animal Crossing. 9:28 p.m. Think to myself, “Wow! The day sure has gone by and I’ve done fucking nothing!” 9:35 p.m. Get a text from my brother telling me I need to set up a Roth IRA and “think about retirement.” 9:41 p.m. Decide now is a great time to watch another teen rom-com from the 90’s/early-2000’s that I used to love but does definitely not hold up. 11:53 p.m. Go on Bumble this time. Still nothing. Everyone’s talking about being too horny online but I guess people can’t be horny for me even when the world is ending. 12:04 a.m. Time to listen to the 2007 Mayday Parade album “A Lesson in Romantics” just one more time. 12:46 a.m. Wonder if my bosses are actually just having their own episode of Punk’d! where they pay me in full for not working at all but then I come back to work and they’re like, “Oh you thought we were serious about saying you’re coming back?” and they all laugh even though this would never happen and I’m very fortunate for working in the place that I am because it could be a lot worse. 12:53 a.m. Look at more memes. 1:13 a.m. Fall asleep even though there is night construction happening right outside. And there you have it! Just follow this routine (or make your own!) to just have at least a little bit of structure to your day in a time where time is, for the most part, absolutely meaningless! |
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