Oprah, Au Revoir.

This afternoon I was in the usual wasteland between coming home from the morning shift and determining that I've successfully put off working out for another afternoon, when I decided to put on Oprah.

I have always been a fan of Oprah, along with other up-by-the-bootstraps, real-fake ladies such as Madonna and Dolly Parton. People like to hate on Oprah, but I have been inclined step to her defense. Until today.

It was about halfway through the show and Oprah was gandering through some home designs by some shiny, cute guy named Nate something. I settled in: I love Oprah's Materialistic shows even more than her Celebrity shows and her Issues shows.

Oprah and Nate were looking at bedding. The first thing I noticed was, none of the bedding looked very exciting. The second thing I noticed was that Oprah was quoting prices as if it were the Home Shopping Network. The third thing I noticed was the whooping. Oprah said the dogs in the picture frame on the bed were "her babies": The audience cheered as if she'd announced she was pregnant. Oprah said the pillows were between $8 and $9: Cries of rejoicing went up through the air. Oprah pointed to some painted boxes: Did someone faint? At one point the camera cut to two jittery women wearing maniacal grins, their hands poised to commence applause. I could have sworn they were high.

All along, Oprah was outyelling them all. Oprah is a renowned exuberant-shouter. She should sit down for an installment of the Actor's Studio, where they would devote an entire segment to her vocal intonation. "Who loves a GOOD. BATHROOMMmm." she chanted, leading everyone to Nate's bathroom furnishings. "You are going to LOVE. THESE. PLATES. AND BOOOOWWWLS!!!"

Now, I'll admit that even though I pretend to be an Oprah fan, I don't actually watch her show that much. Had it changed? I thought back to the last time I saw it, which was when she had James Frey on to talk about his edgy memoir of drug addiction, A Million Little Pieces. I've never read A Million Little Pieces and am not sure if I will. But I left that show feeling embarrassed for Frey and certain that if I bought his book, it would be in spite of Oprah rather than because of her. Frey had to sit there and tolerate excruciating amounts of adulation, and he even filmed a "my home life"-type segment bathed in gauzy lighting gels and cheesy voiceovers. As Frey sat there looking strained, I began to worry that this was the sort of experience that might make him start using again. I started to feel sorry for him, but then remembered how many books he was selling.

Let's not even go into the most recent Tom Cruise appearance.

So I guess Oprah has been this way for awhile, but it always seemed to me like she was just riding happily on her success and really trying to deliver something enjoyable. She'd gone from sleazy TV to power TV and she was celebrating and giving tons of shit away. Sure, let her shout it up. I'd be shouting too.

But now, it felt much less like a show and much more like a shill -- and for third-rate Pottery Barn imitations, no less. Then she proceeded to claim that Ricky Martin, whose album was released (that's right, he has a new album) two months ago, was "back." She ceded the stage so that Martin could perform a song that I thought was "Livin' La Vida Loca" until I realized it was only a new song that happens to sounds just like "Livin' La Vida Loca." It was as if Oprah, along with the guests on her show, had all become Xerox copies of some earlier, better thing.

And so I say godspeed, dear Oprah. I bid you a fair journey, but I can no longer sail with you.

I Am Waiting While the CMS Processes My Request.

I realized today that the majority of my working life, and a disconcerting amount of my personal life, adds up to a long string of two- to 10-second computer vacuums. Thousands upon thousands of times I have sat, slack in a chair, eyes glazed over as some processor or network tried to keep up with my request. It dawned on me today that the publishing system at my job requires me to wait at least two to four seconds every single time I perform a task. EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. Open... edit... add... delete... enter... save... This is the life of a "web producer." And I have never, ever once in my computer life, worked on a machine where everything was up to speed. It's like a specially designated hell for someone with my temperament -- the person who, from childhood on, thrived on finishing the test, the race, the dinner, and apparently birth order, FIRST.

This adds up to a devastating loss of time and spirit, when you think about it (and maybe you've noticed: I have). In these micro-eons I imagine brain cells imploding, collagen breaking down, bones thinning and unquantifiable modules of life-force going irreparably dim. Is it better to spend most of your day waiting for computers to work? Or is it better to spend most of your day waiting for (and working for) something else to work, such as social justice or global rescue missions? This is what I thought about today as I waited for my employer's poorly-written proprietary software to accomodate a basic Web site change that perhaps three people might notice.

A bout of ennui? Perhaps.

Yeah, I've been grappling lately with the Parachute Rainbow. There's a great psychological question buried in all of this: Is more choice better, or worse? Objectively speaking, it's pretty fuckin' great to grow up being told you can be anything you want to be and have that more or less be true. Until you come up against your own personality and societal realities. Part of an e-mail to a friend today sums it up:

I can't close the other doors [in life] -- it's like, I *could* decide to be with [boyfriend] and stick with my current livelihood but... hey, what if I decide to move to a small, mountainy town and own a coffee shop as an independent single woman and then meet the rough-hewn-yet-brainy-and-hilarious man of my dreams and pen some outrageously popular book? I mean, we wouldn't want to shut off that possibility, now, would we?! So anyway... oops, I just turned 80! Time to go feed the pigeons and pick up my social security check...

Or Maybe It's Just Me.

Laugh, and the whole world laughs with you: Except for when they just stare at you with disdain.

I had never heard of Dane Cook until this week, and I started listening to some of his routines while at work. With my headphones on, I did that sort of lean-forward-and-don't-breathe laughing that makes people think, "Man, she must be listening to something really hysterically funny." And I was! Or so I thought.

My boss pulled up the "Car Alarm" routine (clip at lower left on this page: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5034153). I started laughing again involuntarily. As I laughed and laughed and the routine continued to play, I slowly realized that no one in the room was amused. They were all just looking at me, like, I can't believe you think this is that funny.

I guess it serves me right for every apathetic stare I've given to Monty Python fans.

Thanks for Sharing.

One of the worst things about the end of a relationship is the Returns. The CDs, the clothing, the things you left behind -- leaving them behind with someone is such a warm act of faith; giving them back is such a cold, bitter acknowledgement of failure. (cf. Ben Folds, "Song for the Dumped")

I have never been especially good at sharing. I'd like to blame it on having my younger siblings touching my stuff all the time without my permission, but the fact is I was selfish before then. I remember my mom, in an unfortunate early effort to teach me about sharing, took one of my Little Golden Books and tried to get me to give it to the housekeeper's daughter. She wanted me to help her write "Yolanda" on the "This Book Belongs To..." page and I freaked out. Why should I have to give this random girl one of MY books, I remember thinking. Why is this happening?

Some people are just born with certain defects in character.

Today, I retain a bank teller's awareness of what holdings lie where in the transaction of lives that is a relationship. Back in June, I was in a relationship that I knew was ending. I had occasion to be at his place when he wasn't there and I pulled out my Radiohead CD and my Secretary DVD like I was saving Private Ryan, not that he would have cared or noticed. Casualties over the last three years include two pairs of earrings and two books (a short story collection by Nathaniel Hawthorne and a hardcover copy of after the quake by Haruki Murakami). The fact that the Murakami is probably now sitting on the shelf of someone who wasn't worthy of it irks me to this day.

The Returns phase is an opportunity for some serious P/A (passive-aggression). The most jaw-dropping instance of this I have witnessed was with guy I dated for a few weeks. He invited me to see an opera for one of our dates; I was going to have to be a little late because of work, so he cutely sent me my ticket with a little penlight so I could find him when I got there.

Not long after I ended things, he called. "Hey, I was wondering if I could get that flashlight back," he said. "I'm going camping with someone this weekend and SHE doesn't have one."

Dear readers, this "flashlight" could not have illuminated more than a twig in the wilderness and our P/A hero damn well knew it. Nonetheless, he insisted that I messenger the flashlight back to him since he HAD to have it for that weekend and I was too busy at work to mail or deliver it myself.

Too stunned to react otherwise, I complied and he was thereafter known in conversation among my friends as "Flashlight Guy."

Another time, I inadvertently tried to break up with someone (see drama queen J.C. below) after we attended a party. He forced the conversation by pressing me on my doubts, I ended it by affirming them. One undesirable detail: He was driving. Riding in the silent car, I noticed that we weren't headed for my place. "Aren't you taking me home?" I asked. "I just have to make a stop first," he said stoicly.

A stop? Like, at the gun dealer? It turned out we landed back at his place. He went inside and came back out, carrying the material evidence of our relationship in his hands: cards, ticket stubs, photos. "I just can't put it in a box with the other ones," he said, breaking down into sobs as he referred to the heartbreaks behind him. Now, it's one thing to have your own shit returned to you. It's a whole other level when you get back the stuff you happily gave away.

If I think about it, the only way I could have stood to get my Radiohead CD and Secretary DVD back in June was to have "stolen" them. Nobody wants to be given their shit back when it was given, or left, in warm spirits. I did a Return this past weekend: a kitchen bowl and concert tickets in exchange for a pair of earrings (must be psychological) and some money I forgot I owed. This time I didn't care about the stuff -- I was just glad I'd never lived with anyone and broken up with them, and felt both glad and sad that my relationships thus far were no bigger than a bread basket.

Holiday Edition Part One: Blingle Bells

The holidays, for me, are a time to cherish loved ones, to appreciate one's blessings and to enjoy family traditions.

It's also a time to remember that my brother is a rich-ass motherfucker.

You see, I am a wage slave who is struggling to pay down her manageable-but-significant credit card debt. Like a yuppie version of the Little Match Girl, I huddle by my Archipelago Botanicals candle in my rented apartment and gaze into the flame, imagining such sugarplums as home ownership and cosmetic laser treatments.

My sister is strapped for cash even more than I am, only she incurred her debt with three small humans (instead of with three-margarita nights, like me). She and her husband have a house, but they also have ravenous, rapacious toddlers and a small business to run.

My parents are doing fine, but they're headed toward retirement and... well, imagining all the potential heartache and financial issues down that road, we'll just save that for another U.M.

Then there's my brother. My brother lives in the Ritz-Carlton, where he owns two places and rents the other one out as a corporate apartment. He drives a BMW SUV, gets his shirts custom-tailored, and buys his furniture in Georgetown. In other words, he could buy and sell my family. I mean, he really could -- he turned a dinky Web business into a small fortune, couldn't he do the same with the Nunezes, make us into a franchise or something? We don't have anything better to do.

Each year in the last decade or so, my family has been a disturbingly accurate microcosm of this country's economy: the rich get richer, the middle class gets middler, the credit debt goes rampant and the parents pick up the slack until they can't anymore. Christmas highlights this issue. It's a very businesslike affair for us: Lists are forwarded and cc'd, briefings are held as to who will handle which gifts for whom. Occasionally partnerships are formed for pricier gifts, sort of the way corporations have had to consolidate in order to survive: "This gift was brought to you by MomChris, a division of Nunez."

A couple of years ago, the family leadership had to acknowledge that the economy had fallen on hard times, and instituted a $50 cap on person-to-person gifts by Nunez siblings. None of us liked the idea of the cap, but I also heaved a sigh of relief. After all, there was no way I was going to be able to match my brother in terms of gift expense, and I was too embarrassed to say so. My sister had already issued warnings that she would be spending less than everyone. So the cap seemed like a good way of preventing anyone from going deeper into debt.

My brother, on the other hand, felt like he wanted to spend more than $50, because even though he's a RAMF, he's a generous guy too. So I got like half my Amazon wish list from him last year, and from me he got... I don't know, an umbrella?

It does make me feel weird and uneasy to know that no matter what we say, this year I will probably not spend nearly as much on my brother's gift as he will on mine. I'm older, and have always been a bit of the Jeanie to my brother's Ferris. Two years ago at the family dentist, when I was forced essentially to put my own teeth on layaway, the receptionist said with dreamy eyes, "Why don't you get your nice brother to help you? He's doing very well..." I've gotten used to it, but still.

When gift-giving time arrives, though, I manage to soldier through my guilt. Somehow it melts away -- maybe it's the warmth of that new cashmere sweater, or the massage bought with my Elizabeth Arden gift certificate.

You've Got Hate.

The community wankfest Friendster must be getting hit hard by MySpace. I'm not talking about the "Friendster Misses You!" pleas that regularly stream through my inbox. I am talking about a very special message that arrived today.

Subject: Re: * Reminder: Christina Nunez has invited you to join Friendster

Sender: [A man with whom I ended a relationship two years ago]@aol.com

Message: I assume you didn't mean to send this. If you did, I'd prefer never to hear from you.

Alrighty then.

There was no indication of what precisely had been sent to J.C., but it wasn't from me. I did invite him to join Friendster -- in 2003. He joined, and was among my friendsters. When we broke up, I took him out of my list. End of Friendstory.

Friendster earns nothing but enemies in this scenario of Internet marketing E-vil. For his part, J.C. gets a reminder of pain and bitterness. And I get my own an unsolicited "reminder" : "Don't forget! I still hate you."

My first reaction to this message was a mixture of confusion and amusement. But then something else took its place: Hurt and sadness. Though I too would check the "prefer never to hear from you" box in my J.C. account settings, it doesn't feel good to inspire such enduring hostility in anyone.

It's a common refrain at the end of relationships: "Do you hate me?" "Now you hate me." "I don't want you to hate me or anything." Some people I know, both male and female, knock themselves out to stay "friends" with people they should leave well enough alone. Nobody wants to be hated, sure -- that's just bad karma. But what's worse about ex hate is you can't control it. Once somebody decides how they feel about you in retrospect, there's nothing you can do (assuming you decide to stay broken up).

Sometimes it gives me a pit in my stomach that in anybody's version of a story, I'd be the bad guy. Still, I accept that if you hurt or disappoint someone, you don't always get the benefit of forgiveness or understanding.

Apparently, even if you do forgive, Friendster ain't never gonna let you forget.

Store Front.

I was reading about where to find pumpkin-flavored ice cream (duh, everywhere) on washingtonpost.com, and noticed that my local ice cream shop was not mentioned.

This made me glad, because I hate my local ice cream shop. I am convinced, in fact, that my local ice cream shop is a front for terrorism or drugs. I do not say this just because the guy who runs it appears to be of foreign descent. I say this because I have never seen such indifference to customer satisfaction in my life. You can walk by the Connecticut Avenue establishment on the brightest, sunniest weekend day and there will be only a 50 percent chance that it is open.

Let us say, for the sake of argument, that it's a day they've decided to open. When you get inside, you are met with middling ice cream, surly service and overpriced product. The last (and I mean last) time I was there, the cashier said to the guy I was with, "How did YOU end up with HER?" referencing the fact that I paid. It was not cute. It was mean. And we had paid like $10 for two cones.

When I lived in New York on Second Avenue at 27th Street, I used to go into this convenience store on Second all the time. I would go in there to buy Little Debbie Snack Cakes. I always thought it was weird that there seemed to be no other twentysomething girls buying snacks in the store -- indeed there were no other females at all in the store. It was almost always full of men, seemingly of Middle-Eastern origin but honestly I couldn't say. Then I saw some TV segment about how "fake storefronts" are set up to "sell heroin." You can spot them, I was informed, by the fact that the windows are always blocked by boxes of cereal and detergent, and by the fact that none of the foodstuffs for sale ever seem to get bought.

This is how I figured out that the Tide-adorned store where I had been buying my dusty Nutty Bars was probably a drugstore in the literal sense. I felt really dumb, just like I felt for patronizing my local ice cream store after I realized what a sham it is. Potbelly, on the other hand, sells a nice, cheap, generous cone.

New York.

A few years ago, I decided I'd had it with New York and was moving to D.C., because I could finally admit to myself that I just liked living here better.

Upon hearing this, people generally regard me with the same polite stare they would give someone who said she really enjoys needlepoint, or who perhaps has gone too long without a diagnosis of some kind. People move to D.C. because they got a job, or because they want to be involved with government, or because they are going to school. Nobody moves here because they like it better than someplace else, especially when that someplace is New York.

After all, New York is Radiohead; D.C. is Kelly Clarkson. New York is Jon Stewart; D.C. is Jay Leno. New York is Brooklyn; D.C. is Fairfax. New York is Tiffany; D.C. is Kay Jewelers.

I'm not going to sit here and type up how D.C. is "cool" or the ways in which New York sucks. D.C. is not cool, and New York doesn't suck, much as I'm tempted reflexively to say that it does. The fact is that I could not enjoy living here without having lived in Manhattan. New York was my fantasy town from about 12 years old and I love many things about it.

This year I have had five personal ties of varying significance vanish in some way, and two of those were friends who joined girlfriends in NYC (p.b., I ain't mad atcha). They're psyched. Why wouldn't they be?

Still, I reserve my right *not* to be jealous, and not to particularly care about New York anymore. Wow, I lived there for seven years of my life... do I miss it? Do I visit a lot? Well, no and no. I miss very much my friends who happen to live there. But the first time I went back, months after leaving, was surreal: Had this really been my home for so long? I felt shame mixed with a sense of unworthiness. It was like running into someone with whom you had a serious love relationship, and feeling absolutely nothing. Who was the me who lived, worked and thought there? I couldn't channel her anymore. Now, the Sunday Times (if I even read it) is like People magazine to me.

You could explain part of my allegiance to D.C. by pointing out that I am "from here," but that wouldn't quite be right. I am from Potomac, Md. -- a land of McMansions, chain stores and bar mitzvahs -- and ventured into D.C. only occasionally during my time at home. Still, I'll admit that's part of my having developed a comfort level here. This weekend included trips to the Target on Rockville Pike, a concert at the Black Cat and a corn maze in Fredericksburg, Va.: aka big-box retail, a middling rock venue and provinciality supreme. It's home. For a change I'm not ambivalent, but grateful.

Note to Self.

I am not alone in my car.

I am not alone in my car. When "Nasty" by Janet Jackson or "Somebody Else's Guy" by Jocelyn Brown comes on, it is not okay to belt it out and do an upper-body running-man. It is not okay to talk out loud about the traffic or what I have to do when I get home, when it is clear I have no ear bud attached to me and my scratched-ass minicar is not outfitted with a speaker phone. It is not okay to talk back to the radio deejays, to gyrate, or to yell at other drivers and make gestures.

It is not okay, because my windows are not tinted and I forget. People, being nosey and intrusive, are liable to look at me in my car and shame me with their judging glances so that I cannot safely commit these behaviors. It is not alright to be illegal in the car, which is a lot easier in D.C. now that one drink could mean you are rolling peril. It is not okay to talk to my friends because a police man might yell at me "THAT'S A $100 TICKET" like one did today, a comment I found startling, not to mention unnecessarily true.

When I am seen flipping someone off or talking to myself or having my own private "American Idol," that is when I become not only me in my car but also, a travesty behind glass. I must remember this in order to avoid becoming a source of entertainment or revenue on the streets of Washington.

Cheese, Pate, Whine.

I can explain my blog delinquency by saying that the last week has constituted one long uncomfortable moment, being that I was sick. It started last Thursday, when I met friends at the venerable sinkhole Fox & Hounds. Keeping it "light," I ordered a salad with blue cheese dressing and some onion rings to go with my two drinks. Then it got ugly. We convened to a back patio, where our hostess had an inspired idea: since we were drinking red wine, why not get out the cheese she had, along with some other gourmet goodies? We put all the comestibles out on a board: stinky, stinky cheeses, some truffle-oil-infused honey (as Lil' Jon would say, WHAT? Yay-yes!), pate de foie gras and apple slices.

As far as I was concerned, this was great. I thought not of the other fats commingling in my tract and dug in, thoroughly enjoying the fare. It wasn't but a half-hour before I found myself pretending to nod along with the patio conversation but only able to listen to one voice, which was coming from my stomach: It was saying, "I am in grievous distress and you are not going to get away with this."

All of a sudden I was greenly proceeding to the hosts' bathroom, where untold dollars in pricy goose liver were deposited. When I came back after too shaky an exit and too prolonged an absence, I felt like Olivia Newton-John as Sandra Dee in Grease, after she smokes her first cigarette. Everyone else, having pulled more or less the same digestive stunt, was fine and looking at me with pity and concern. I, on the other hand, was a gastronomic Urkel.

Depending on whom you ask (well okay, just ask my mom), this was not a "real" reaction but a precursor of what was to follow, which was congestion, pains, sneezing and overall misery. I, the person who scoffs at the flu shot, who waves off Purell, who "never gets sick," was SICK. We're talking not just sniffly but laid-out, bring-out-the-hazmat-suit, hack-up-a-lung, NyQuil sick. The upside is, instead of working, I got to catch up on my New Yorkers and watch Collateral along with just enough director's commentary to ascertain that Michael Mann is a disappointingly earnest and self-indulgent guy (darned if he isn't talented though).

Be sure to check out the random link at right if you haven't already, it's pretty good.