When I was over stateside for my sister in law's wedding last June, the other bridesmaids and I went to the local drugstore to pick up some funny things for the wedding night. We were thinking some condoms, maybe some lube...after all, this was North Carolina, and only a drugstore. Were we shocked! That place was like adultshop.com! Little bitty vibrators, every condom you could imagine, flavored oils, rubber rings with little knobs on them... Good grief! I had no idea you could get such things in a normal store! Needless to say, the gift bag that we filled up had us in hysterics...and undoubtedly embarrassed the newlyweds horribly.

And to think I have to show my driver's license just to get Sudafed!

Really, I haven't seen vibrators except the muscle ache ones in the "heating pads and ice packs" aisle - but the oils are prominently displayed. It is funny what drug stores sell nowadays - our local has tee shirts and all these gadgets"as seen on tv" and of course, a huge seasonal aisle for the holiday stuff. Soon it will be filled with sunscreen and beach toys. Spring break!

And the mankini? What a passion killer!

but they may or may nor fill your birth control prescription. Fab.

manscaping to get away with wearing that mankini...

espeically my homegirl Sue -- :-)
congrats!

is just great! I really like the black socks and shoes with it, too.

Congratulations, frontpagers!

is like a train wreck; I can't look away!

Sex toys in the drugstore?  That's kind of cool, but odd.  I wouldn't think there would be a big market.  For lube, yes, but vibrators and things aren't exactly standardized products.

Awesome new frontpagers, yay!

Fun fun! I've really enjoyed reading your posts, Lilliana28, parentalunit1, and Sue in Queens! I'm looking forward to more great stuff!

about McCain and his supposed affair? because I think this is simply hilarious. All that talk of people who didn't want to support Hillary because her HUSBAND'S affair- not even one of her OWN- might be distracting and here we've got the previously adulterous McCain in a possible affair with a LOBBYIST? hehehehehehehehe.

Personally, I don't give a flying fig who someone decided to screw around with- unless said screwing is in turn screwing US. Because I'm more worried about the way he whored himself out as a Senator, not as a man.

congrats, new front pagers!

yuk on the Borat mankini.

I will have to pay closer attention next time I am in Walgreens because I have missed all this stuff. Are the vibrators listed as such or 'personal massagers'?

grocery and drug, have lube and massage oils here.  I don't think I've seen vibrators, though.

Simone has started calling me mother.  Not in a mean teenage way, but she just started calling me mother.  I guess it's cute, but my legal name is actually mommy or mama.

What a super accomplishment.

I have on my mind a "party" I attended on Wednesday night.  I got the call from a neighbor at about 5pm, that she was hosting a product party at 7:15pm and "a bunch of the other women from the neighborhood" would be there.

I am a sucker for new lip gloss, and I like to socialize with the neighbor ladies.  I showed up with a big smile and an enthusiastic attitude.  Turns out, there were only 3 guests.  And it wasn't so much a "party" as it was a business launch for the neighbor who invited me - she had recently become a consultant.  She allowed her mentor to give the presentation.

I listened intently to the information that was presented, but in matters of consumer products, I am a skeptic.  I looked at the bottles and none of them had the ingredients listed. I was told was that I should be impressed by a) the lack of mineral oil and b) the presence of nanospheres, among other things.

The assumption was that everyone has skin that fits neatly in either the "normal" or "acne prone" categories.  Mine decidedly does not.  I won't bore you with the details, suffice it to say I can't buy products that don't address my many unfortunate skin problems.   And they didn't demo any lip gloss.

The systems were sold with prices in the hundreds of dollars.  The implication was that you would not get results if you didn't buy the entire system.  We were told that 90% of participants will sign up to be a consultant because that way, they can order products for themselves at wholesale prices.  "Why would anyone pay retail when they did not have to?"  Why, indeed.

At the end of the presentation, people headed toward the door and I, too, shuffled my underwhelmed self in the direction of the exit.  Confronted by my host, who asked if I was going to buy anything, I replied, "Nothing really caught my eye."  Her chilly response was off-putting but I couldn't justify spending $50+ just to show her how much I value her friendship.

I know it's rude to go to home parties and not buy anything, but I honestly did not like any of the products.  I thought the presentation was an insult to my intelligence and the products were ridiculously overpriced.  I was not going to rob my children of the luxury of a weekly takeout pizza (or 5, as the case may be).  Money's tight.

So, what is YOUR take on home-based product parties?  Do you always buy something?  Do you host them?

may enjoy this diary on DailyKos, and particularly the comments below equating politicians to the various characters.

I think my favorite suggestion was Kucinich = Dobby.

Nice work ladies. I haven't had much time to comment or post lately - things have been really crazy at work becuase I got behind and things got busy while DH was away. (I'm actually sneaking a few minutes here when I'm supposed to be working right now.) But I have been reading as always and I know you all will make the reading fun and interesting.

Borat was one of those movies that I both loved and hated - left me both nauseous and gasping with laughter. And that image, man, you just can't get that out of your head, can you? I don't really think there is an equivalently disturbing garment for women - correct me if I'm wrong.

It snowed a little bit here today and everything shut down, like it always does. The kids had an impromptu playdate with some neighbors, sledding on their front lawn. It was really nice.

I chose to go to yoga instead of watching the debate last night. Does that make me a bad person?

Have a great weekend everyone!

Good to see your stuff, ladies!

Yes, folks, we are living the dream. DH has just woken up. I gave him the card and cologne. Deer-in-headlights look sets in. He has forgotten out anniversary.

I hear you saying, cut the guy some slack. Six weeks of 70-hour, seven working days is bound to affect a guy. Ladies and gentlemen, yesterday was his birthday. The family joke has always been "Rachel selected the 23rd as the wedding date so Anthony will never forget it's the day after his birthday." so much for that theory.

I hate to say it, but it's a big deal to me. I come from a family that's really good with remembering important dates - my parents sent DH a present for his birthday and a card and a present for us. DH's family? Not so good. In fact, terrible. He recognized it, and I always said, look, it's important to me to remember these things. Even if it's just a card, it's really, really important to me.

I just want to cry. It's been a really hard month and a half with the working and I was looking forward to celebrating our anniversary. I know, overdramatic, and feel free to tell me to get over myself. But there you go.

I feel almost... human again!  We are over the hump w/the flu.  Both kids' fevers have broken and mine is down to 100.  Yippee!  

Looks like I missed a McCain scandal while the 100th kiddie show was on TV.  I've seen the Wizard of Oz 4 times this week...pity me!

Another parent and I are putting together a Read (and this year, a Write-) a-thon for our school, and we were putting the translated versions into the computer.

It's funny to me that (a) when I hear a word in spanish I can generally spell it correctly and (b) my touch typing skills were fighting me at first to spell in spanish. Certain combinations that roll off my fingers had to be stopped.

It was an excellent brain workout. It was also nice to feel that if I just practice with my vocabulary some more, I'm probably not as bad off as I thought. The grammar is still instinctive and easy.

And yes, never fear, we're getting a final proofread from a native speaker.

The other night I was shocked and disappointed to see the ugly spectacle of that shameless pander Representative Jack Kingston (R) on Bill Maher's Real Time as he pushed unsubstantiated Republican propaganda and misinformation gleaned directly from hoax e-mails.  

Republican Congressman Embraces Obama Hoax Email

[Overtime, and pretty quickly now, it'll make sense to keep a list of stuff like this. On Friday night's Bill Maher show, Rep. Jack Kingston (R-GA) claimed that Barack Obama refuses to say the pledge of allegiance to the American flag. This along with other bogus claims about Obama come from the hoax emails circulating on the internet.]

I like Bill Maher but he apparently has some kind of issue with Barack Obama, a few weeks ago he compared African-Americans who support Obama to those who supported O.J. Simpson, which got him plenty of boos, and he seems to be more than a little sympathetic to the Clinton campaign. In this last episode he gave the right wingers almost a free hand to go after Obama distorting his positions and record, and there was no one on the panel to rebut these assertions.

It's interesting how much better the show is now that the writers have returned, the first few episodes where Bill tried to wing it were well below the standards that Real Time usually sets.  Without his writers Maher seemed lost at times, you better believe writers matter folks.

Maher has a well-known history of dating black women, so I'm surprised that Bill doesn't have a better take on the African-American perspective and greater sensitivity to the issues that concern the Black community in this country.  Whether or not Bill Maher harbors some unresolved issues concerning Black folks can only be speculated upon, but it seems obvious that he doesn't fully grasp the nonracial post partisan approach that the Obama campaign is attempting to pursue in an effort to create unity in America.  Has Bill Maher been manipulated by the right-wing in this instance, or are we seeing some deeper manifestations of racial animus held by Mr. Maher surfacing subtly and not so subtly on his HBO show?

Last season on Real Time one of Maher's guests, NPR's Michel Martin, openly hinted at some of his apparent conflicting attitudes concerning race and perhaps even some underlying misogynistic tendencies that Bill may be harboring, and after watching the start of this recent season it seems Michel may have been on target.

Republican Congressman Embraces Obama Hoax Email

Vaccinating Boys for Girls’ Sake?

[Gardasil protects against four types of H.P.V. Two have been found in 70 percent of cervical cancer cases. The other two types account for 90 percent of genital warts, which affect both men and women. Immunization gives protection for five years.

Sometime this year, Merck will submit data to the F.D.A. seeking approval to give Gardasil to boys. In Australia, Mexico and countries in the European Union, the vaccine is approved for boys.

"We have a very clear benefit that we offer to men," said Dr. Richard M. Haupt, Merck’s executive director of clinical research, referring to the warts, "even if they don’t feel they need to have an altruistic reason to get the vaccine."]

[H.P.V. is the most common sexually transmitted infection. There are estimates of six million new infections in the United States each year. Yet, of more than 100 types of H.P.V., only a handful may result in disease. Most people who are infected have no symptoms and can transmit it unknowingly.

At least a half-million Americans each year develop genital warts, which can reoccur. But is Gardasil’s protection against warts enough for parents of sons?

"It’s not life-threatening, but it’s very stressful," said Susan L. Rosenthal, a specialist in adolescent psychology at Galveston and an adviser to Merck. "Genital warts are a really yucky disease and they make you feel bad about an important, sensitive body part. Psychologically, it’s not an insignificant infection."]