My Guiltiest Pleasure

I like puns. That's not my guiltiest pleasure, but I do really like a well-crafted pun. My favorite is from the movie Cars, when Lightning McQueen finds out Doc is the Hudson Hornet, so he goes to Flo's to tell everybody and he's like, "He's won three Piston Cups!" and Mater goes, "He did what in his cup?"


That gets me. Every time. But no, not my guiltiest pleasure. 


My guiltiest pleasure is prison. Any show having anything to do with prison or jail or correction officers or...anything. Life on the Chain Gang, Beyond Scared Straight...there was one, I can't remember what it was called, but it was women in prison discussing their crimes. I like jail, too, don't misunderstand. Jail has been showing on Spike TV and it's pretty fabulous. It's got the hilarious (though sad) drunks, junkies, and nutbars (I say this affectionately) of COPS with some really incredible and emotional stories-- like the young girl getting picked up with her shoplifting drug-addict mother or the anorexic altering medical records in order to go back on a drug that worked better for her. 


Especially anything taking place in Maricopa County, Arizona, like Life on the Chain Gang, Police Women of Maricopa County, and any specials about prisoner life and the Tent City. But maybe I shouldn't say "especially" since most of the shows are from Maricopa anyway because their sheriff, Joe Arpaio...I don't know, supports them, I guess. 


Arpaio's a controversial figure in corrections-- there's been claims his practices have been unconstitutional and inhumane, like limiting inmate food to two meals a day and the fact that temperatures in Tent City are extreme, it being Arizona and all. He's extremely strict. Which makes for good TV, but isn't doing anything about the recidivism rate which matches the national average. 


Which is a shame. I'd be all for it if it did something about the insane number of incarcerated we have (almost 2.5 million in 2008), but it isn't. 


I think my fascination is something like rubbernecking a car accident. It's not that I get some kind of sick pleasure in watching people suffer, it's just that in those moments I want so badly to have their point of view. That's why I look at car accidents, anyway, I wonder what those involved are thinking-- what they saw, what they heard. I've got the same draw to school shootings: any movie or TV show or book about them and I'm sucked in. Hostage situations, too. I'm so curious about the terror, what goes through people's minds and how they handle it. I'd love to know what was going through O.J. Simpson's mind while he was running from the police. 


I don't think that's so different from everybody else if they really thought about it. We've all got that dark side...I guess it's just how we choose to indulge it that makes the difference. 


Oooh, DEA's on! 

Manny

I can not believe today's Manny's fifth birthday. 5. FIVE. Five years...he's starting school in September, I feel so old! It feels like it wasn't that lon ao I was giving him bottles and singing "Golden Slumbers" to him as I put him to bed...and Elton John's "Daniel"...and Fountains of Wayne's "Hey, Julie" but I changed the words to "Hey, Daniel" when I was feeding him because it was difficult to get him to eat unless he was distracted by something else. 


I lived with Mick & Deb & Manny from the time Man was 9 months old to his first birthday. 


Today he told me he was my #1 fan. And gave me a black eye. 


I had picked him up to give him a birthday hug and my father started tickling him over my shoulder. Manny wiggled and accidentally slammed his head into my sunglasses, which pushed them hard into the side of my nose and under my eye. It's bruising nicely. 


He doesn't really "get" birthdays and holidays. He knows exciting things happen, and he's excited other people are excited, but that's about the extent of it. 


Like at Christmas, he'd be as happy with 1 present as he'd be with 100. My brother jokes he takes longer than any other kid in the world to open his presents because he opens one, and he's thrilled with it, and then you have to remind him there's more. Woe to you if the second-through-the-last presents aren't as interesting as the first, because that's the one he'll keep trying to go back to. 


He doesn't understand games, either. I got him CandyLand a few years ago because every kid should have CandyLand. I shouldn't have even written "because" in there. So anyway, I got him CandyLand and he just doesn't...he doesn't get it. He doesn't understand following a set of rules to achieve a goal-- everything must be immediate gratification. His birthday last year was torture for him because he found out there would be cake and he couldn't think of anything else until he finally got the cake. 


He's totally obsessed with cars. And I mean obsessed. He knows every car on the road, make and model. It's given him a few cool chances, like when fancy car owners hear him get all excited over their cars they invite him to sit in it, but then he sits like a lump because he doesn't care to pretend to drive or honk the horn or anything. Then it's awkward for a minute but the owners are gracious about it...I guess they see something's wrong. And, the other day actually, Deb took Manny with her to go get a pinata for his party on Saturday and when he picked it the store associate handed it to him and Manny said, "Whoa, look at that Dodge Charger!!" Or Challenger or... Charlemagne, I don't know, doesn't matter, and the associate gave them a 15% discount on their order because of Manny's awesomeness. 


He's a sweet boy...I wonder what he'd be like if he weren't autistic/Asperger's. I wonder where he is under those layers of distance and detachment...I wonder who he is under it. 


Either way, the Manny I have is better than the Manny I don't, and I adore the Manny I have. 


Happy birthday, sweetheart. Aunt Joz loves you.