GIRLS ARE PRETTY

Raised By Wolves Day!

You were raised by wolves since birth, and you’ve recently been rescued from the woods and now you’re in the process of being socialized to live with humans. For science.

No one can understand why you’re fighting them so much, and you can’t explain it since all you can do is growl and slash at people who get too close. Finally they call in another guy who was rescued from wolves so he can interpret your growls.

“He fell in love with a wolf from another pack. He wants to be set free to go and be with her,” the other raised-by-wolves guy explains to them after you snarl at him a bunch.

“Cool with us as long as we can watch,” one of the scientists says

“For science,” the other adds.

They release you back into the wild, then you spend the next six years being videotaped by some guys in trees while you have sex with a female wolf. For science.

The videotaping ends when the female wolf dies and you’re rescued from the woods again. Once you become socialized enough to understand stuff you find out millions of humans have watched video recordings of you having sex with your dearly departed wolf girlfriend, so you activate your primal wolf instinct and murder lots of scientists. For love.

Happy Raised By Wolves Day!

Play The Bar Game “Just Me” Day!

“Who thinks they should have died in someone else’s place?” shout.

There will be a show of hands. Six or seven at least.

“Who says the words ‘It should’ve been you’ in the mirror every single morning?”

Another show of hands. Four or five.

“Who’s here solely to drench in liquor the part of the brain that remembers the year 1986?”

Only a couple hands.

“1987?”

Lotta hands.

“Who here feels like every single day he walks on this earth is an affront to nature? That the only way to pay for a misfortune that happened to someone you loved is to inflict it upon yourself?”

Two hands. Yours and the redhead’s.

“Who’s all done? Who’s had enough of trying to believe what everyone insists, that it wasn’t your fault? Right now. Tonight. You can feel it in your bones. Who’s all done?”

One hand. Yours.

“Just me! I won!”

Big cheers for you. A few slaps on the back. A kiss on the cheek from the redhead.

You did it. You won.

Happy Play The Bar Game “Just Me” Day!

Jeff Died Yesterday The TV Show Day!

You are the star of a fun new show called “Jeff Died Yesterday.” The show takes place on the day after you died, and everyone is sad, some more so than others. Your Mom and Dad are very sad. Your younger brother Dan is a little sad. Your older sister Jen is not sad at all. Your friends aren’t sad at all either. They’re attractive and they’re trying to have sex with your older sister Jen, who’s always saying, “Pssh. Not over my little brother’s dead body” which gets a laugh from the crew. Your older sister Jen does sometimes have sex with your friends though. Ratings.

The challenge in each episode involves everyone at your funeral having to try and comfort your Mom and Dad or your aunts when they burst into tears. Every week, another of the mourners is kicked off the show. Yes it’s a reality show and you’re really dead. Sorry. This week your friend Pete gets kicked off when the judges say he was the worst at the funeral for getting a boner while your coffin was being lower into the grave. Pete says this isn’t the last we’ve heard from him and we’ll see big things from him at future funerals one day.

Happy Jeff Died Yesterday The TV Show Day!

Wish Upon A Couple That’s Breaking Up At Dinner Day!

When you see a couple out at a restaurant and they’re clearly in the middle of breaking up, go and stand next to their table, put one hand on each of their dinners, and make a wish.

It’s a guess-wish, in that you don’t really know if what you wish for is possible to come true. The way it works is you can wish for their future to be transferred over to you. The only wishes that will come true are when you wish for something that would have come to pass for that couple had they stayed together. 

For example, if you wish for a billion dollars, the chance that it will come true for you is as wild as it coming true for them had they stayed together. Probably not very likely.

But if you wish for a gradually declining romantic interest in your partner, until you find yourself middle aged and wondering why you decided to decline into a joyless marriage with someone you should have broken up with all those years ago in that restaurant that one night when you mustered up the courage, there’s a very good chance it will come true!

So go make your wish. And remember, you do have to touch the food on both their plates. To get the full potency of your wish, wait for the entrees, not appetizers.

Happy Wish Upon A Couple That’s Breaking Up At Dinner Day!

The Boyfriend Your Dad Chased Away Day!

You still think about Dewey, your boyfriend from when you were seventeen, the one who made you feel as rare as a diamond, as light as a breeze, as free as a supermarket sausage sample. 

You now know that you settled for your husband. As you grew older and you dated more men you gradually accepted that no one would love you with the strength that Dewey loved you, so you settled for less. 

“All through this divorce,” you tell your Dad. “All the time, I keep looking back on Dewey, and how even though it’s ridiculous, I wonder what would have happened if we just kept on loving each other. I wonder what would have happened if you hadn’t chased him away.”

Your Dad and Mom share a look.

“Tell her,” your Mom says.

You ask what she’s suggesting he tell.

“Tell her,” your Mom repeats.

“I didn’t exactly,” your Dad begins. “I didn’t chase Dewey away, if we’re speaking literally.”

You burst out crying. Of course. Your parents only told you that Dewey was chased away to spare your feelings. Because not even Dewey loved you. No one ever loved you the way you dream of being loved.

“No, no,” your Dad says when you stop crying long enough to listen. “I didn’t Chase Dewey away. I paid him to go away. And I’ve been paying him ever since.”

“Your father pays Dewey $71,500 per year,” your Mom says. “All to keep him from ever dating you.”

“But why?” you ask.

“Never liked that long hair of his,” your Dad says. “Or that car he drove. Too fast. Not letting him drive around my daughter.”

Over the course of fifteen years your father has paid your high school boyfriend a middle-class salary to prevent him from dating you. His starting payment was $46,300, but your father continued to give him increases commensurate with the average cost of living inflation.

“He’s still not dating anybody,” your Mom says with a smile. “Never did move on from you. Just lived off your father’s money and waited for the day when—”

“When the checks would stop coming,” you say.

Your Dad looks unsure of this.

“Please Daddy,” you say. “Cut off the checks.”

Your Dad doesn’t know what to do. He doesn’t know how to stop being a Daddy to his little girl.

“I know the love I’ve settled for and the love I deserve,” you tell him. “Dewey can give me the love I deserve.”

Your Dad thinks for a second, then says, “I’ll send him just one more check, so he has the money to cut that hair of his.”

You throw yourself into your Dad’s arms then you Google Dewey and find out that he won’t be needing that extra check to get a haircut after all because Dewey’s completely bald now.

Happy The Boyfriend Your Dad Chased Away Day!

Telling People How Much They Hurt You Day!

Got someone in your life who is capable of hurting you more than you thought yourself capable of being hurt? Presently staring across a table at a lover or a spouse or just a sexual passer-by who can’t stop ripping up your heart and tossing it into the recycling bin? Today’s the day to let him or her (or them, polyamory is getting more respect every day) know how much power they have over you. Say the following:

“You know I’ve dropped all my defenses and basically placed myself emotionally at your mercy. I’m in the palm of your hand. So when you do [whatever they do that sucks], you’re pretty much just clenching your fist and squeezing me into gummy scuzz in your palm. Stop it?”

They’ll probably respond with, “I had no idea.” That’s because they aren’t as vulnerable to you as you are to them, because they don’t feel as much for you as you do for them. This is love. One party always loves the other more than they are loved back, which blows.

The most important thing to remember is this: If the person who hurts you says they don’t like being confronted the way you’re confronting them, apologize. Apologize quickly, before they decide you’re not worth the headache. Hurry, before they go.

Happy Telling People How Much They Hurt You Day!

Apologize For Falling Out Of Love With Your Boyfriend Day!

“Sorry,” tell him. “Sorry I’ve grown.”

He’ll say he appreciates the apology, but it doesn’t make up for anything.

“I just wasn’t thinking,” explain. “For a long while there I was in love with you. Then I had a bunch of life experiences and learned new insights and new possibilities for who I can be. I knew letting all that stuff happen would change me, but I never thought it would make me fall out of love with you.”

Your boyfriend will tell you should have considered it. You should have at least worried about how changing and growing as a person might affect your ability to stay in love with him.

“You’re right,” tell him. “I was inconsiderate. Especially when my father died and I let my grief and my subsequent maturation into an adult with a deceased parent get the better of me. I wasn’t thinking about how those emotional developments would make me grow bored with what you and I shared.”

Your boyfriend will pace the room in front of you. He’ll look like he’s jumping out of his skin. He’ll ask how he can be sure you won’t do this again.

“Well I really don’t think you have to worry about it,” tell him. “I doubt I’m going to fall back in love with you or anything.”

“You better not!” your boyfriend will shout.

Make him say he’s sorry for raising his voice to you. If he says he isn’t sorry, tell him you’ll devote the rest of your life to making sure he’s sorry. 

Happy Apologize For Falling Out Of Love With Your Boyfriend Day!

Anonymous asked: I have wanted to write you for a long time. I read every single post you have ever made and I love it all. I would buy the book, if there ever was one. I cannot believe not more people know about this. I am genuinely a bit a afraid that you will stop writing. - Sofie

Thanks Sofie! You’re in luck. There is a book!

http://amzn.com/B0046LUGH6

Happy Cruelty Day includes the best of the first three years of Girls Are Pretty plus over 50 entries that have never appeared online.

In His Car Day!

Get in his car and let him drive you to his current girlfriend’s house. “That’s where she lives,” he says. “More rooms than anyone would know what to do with.”

You note that it doesn’t look like anything could ever go wrong in there. He confirms that nothing ever does.

“The promise of a girl who grew up in a house like that,” you say. “I can see why you’re with her.”

He says, “Then why at this moment do I want nothing more than to speed away, leave that house and this whole town, and earn a living driving across the country robbing small-town general stores with you.”

Kiss him and he’ll step on the gas. He’s already made his choice. He’d rather live on the road making love at 70 mph with you than die safe and warm in the biggest house you’ve ever seen. Kiss him and you’ll be on a highway putting every memory over your eastern shoulder. Kiss him and he’s yours.

“But I want to be a veterinarian,” you say. “I love animals.”

He shrugs and says, “Suit yourself.” Then he drives you to a corner where you can catch your bus.

Twenty years from now when you’re treating a sick cat for fur balls you’ll remember the choice he gave you. You’ll Google him and discover he’s fat and sells ad space on roadside billboards.

“You made it to the highway,” you’ll whisper at your computer screen, before returning to the cat sitting on your examination table waiting for his dropper full of medicine.

Happy In His Car Day!

Quit Putting Off The Important Stuff Day!

You’ve been sitting on the couch all day long watching Netflix and dicking around on the internet knowing full well you have to get out into the world and bury your roommate’s dead body in a shallow grave before dawn (you two had a fight over the fact that you’ve been using his conditioner and things got out of hand so you stabbed him to death). This is always the way. Every time you have a big project you end up putting it off until the very last minute, glueing your eyes to whatever screens will accept them, and then you find yourself scrambling to find a store open in the middle of the night that will sell you some lime and a shovel. Oh Christ what are you doing now? You’re calling Jeff? Don’t call Jeff.

“Hey Jeff can I borrow your truck? Zipcar only has compacts.”

Of course he’s going to say no, at least until you lay a guilt trip on him. Why didn’t you just reserve the Zipcar pickup or SUV as soon as you killed your roommate? And now you’re going to try and rope him into helping you dig the grave too, aren’t you?

“I’ll pay you forty bucks. I just gotta get Brad into the ground. Kind of a last minute deal.”

This is how terrible you are at time management. You think you saved yourself some time getting Jeff to help dig but now that Jeff’s an accessory you have to dig two graves, and bury him in the second after you hit him in the head with your shovel.

“Yeah but I get to keep his truck so free truck.”

Okay fine that’s a good point.

Happy Quit Putting Off The Important Stuff Day!

Wedding Vow Day!

You and Larry were always best friends. Ever since college, when you two would stay up all night long watching bad movies together. Or when you’d run to each other for a shoulder to cry on after a bad breakup, or a sympathetic ear after a terrible date. 

After college you moved in together and spent a couple years living as roommates, but you were such close friends you might as well have been an old married couple. Each of you felt like it might be impossible to find someone you enjoyed being with as much as each other, and so one night many years ago you made a vow.

“If neither of us finds someone before we’re 35, we’ll marry each other,” Larry said. He even got down on one knee when he said it.

“35?” you said. “Okay, that’s about when I’ll have given up the search. Deal!”

You consummated the vow by microwaving some popcorn and sitting down together to watch a DVD of Lost Season 2.

For a while there, it seemed like you two might end up honoring that vow you made, until three years ago when you met Stephen, who was an usher at your sister’s wedding.

You fell for Stephen almost instantly, and you knew you’d fallen for him based on the one true test of whether you love someone or not: you couldn’t wait to introduce him to Larry.

It wasn’t long before you moved out of your apartment with Larry and into one with Stephen, and after a couple more whirlwind years Stephen got down on one knee and asked you to join him in a for-real marriage vow. The date was set for this weekend, when you will be exactly 34 years and four months old.

“Just under the wire,” you told Larry. “Guess you won’t have to marry me after all!”

“Guess not,” Larry said. “Looks like Stephen’s going to beat me to it.”

It did look like that. Until yesterday, when Stephen’s body was found floating in the river. His head had been bludgeoned, his wallet gone. Appeared to be a mugging gone too far.

You ran to the only person you’d ever run to for comfort at such a horrible time. 

“How! How could this happen?” you cried into Larry’s lapel. “Just days before we were to get married!”

That’s when Larry chose to provide you with some words of comfort that proved to be rather strange.

“Well I promise to keep up my end of our marriage vow, even if Stephen couldn’t keep up his.”

You were a bit thrown, but you managed to ignore that he said it. People say odd things to someone in grief, and better just to move past it. But when you left his apartment that night, his words kept repeating in your head, and they chilled you a little more every single time you recalled them. You ended up telling your cab driver to change routes to take you to the police station.

“There’s our motive,” the lead detective says. “People have gone to way more extremes to make sure they got married. The only question is, will he do it again?”

The sting is on. You’re going to go away on what you’ll tell Larry is a vacation to get your head about you, but really you’ll just be hidden away in a safehouse. When you come back they’ll pair you up with Detective Donald Lawrence, a handsome undercover cop who you’ll pretend to have met in Playa Del Carmen and you were both so swept off your feet that you decided to get married.

“Then we wait,” the lead detective says.

This sting operation will hopefully uncover nothing at all. But deep in your heart you know that Larry really wants to get married, and he’ll do whatever it takes to make sure you remain unwed for just a few months longer, just long enough to guarantee that you have to honor your vow to marry him. God be with anyone who wins your heart before you turn 35, because they’ll be saying their prayers for a quick, painless death at Larry’s bloody hands before they ever get the chance to say, “I do.”

Happy Wedding Vow Day!

If You Two Go Home Together Tonight People Will Die Day!

Go ahead. Go find an empty booth and talk to each other. Find out how much you both have in common. Find out how easy your conversation feels, how it feels like you’ve known each other for years. How it feels like you two intended to meet each other here tonight, almost like you’d planned it. Or someone did.

Go ahead and lean in for that first kiss. It will lead to a second. Then you’ll just fall into his body, your head against his chest, listening to his heart. It will be disarming to your friends who see you. It will look like you’re already boyfriend and girlfriend. It will look like they’ve seen you clumped up together in a booth like that every Saturday night for years. It will look totally expected, completely natural, and they’ll wonder if it’s always been this way.

Go ahead and leave the bar. Wander the streets telling each other the truth. Hold hands even. Fuck it. You already feel like you should, like it’s perfectly acceptable for two people who just met a couple hours ago to walk around your city holding hands. Stop occasionally to kiss. Stop occasionally to just press yourselves together. Stop occasionally. 

Go ahead. Go on home to your apartment or his. Go ahead and fall into each other’s embrace before you even get through the apartment door. Go ahead to the bedroom and spend the next 72 to 96 hours absolutely devouring each other’s flesh, only to find that you’ve barely even begun to sate your hunger.

Go ahead and go home together tonight. Just know that if you do, people will die.

Not saying who. Not saying how. Not saying why.

But if you two go home together tonight, people will die.

Not saying if the people who are going to die are just fine with that, since they know your love is worth their lives coming to an end. Just saying what’s to be said.

You go home. They go away. It’s only fair that you know what’s at stake. Sometimes, there are repercussions to two people falling in love.

Happy If You Two Go Home Together Tonight People Will Die Day!

Your Dying Dad Wants To Talk About “Inception” Day!

It was on his hospital room TV last night.

“It was ingenious,” he says.

You nod and try not to say anything.

“So well thought out, the way it moved among all those levels within levels of consciousness,” he continues, rasping now.

Say, “I’m glad you enjoyed it.”

“And just a riveting action movie to boot,” he adds. “Maybe the smartest, most exciting action movie ever.”

“Can I get you anything from the cafeteria?” you ask, trying to change the subject.

“You didn’t like it?” your Dad says.

You shrug coyly. He gets the picture.

“I can see why you might not have liked it,” your Dad says. “You were always a simpler kid. Never really interested in being challenged by a movie.”

That’s it.

“Look, I spent half of 2010 listening to idiots tell me that because I didn’t like a movie that had to use clumsy exposition to spell out what was happening in every goddam scene, I’m the one who’s not intelligent. Maybe people who liked Inception are the ones who aren’t smart because they’re so easily manipulated by a movie that’s more concerned with insisting to the audience how smart it is than with being entertaining.”

Your Dad is silent for a minute. Then…

“I’m on my fucking deathbed here.”

“I know, it’s just…”

“You tell me you don’t think I’m smart? When I’m on my deathbed? Just because I liked a movie I saw on TNT?”

You’re ashamed.

“I’ll admit all that snow shit looked like an assy Bond movie,” your Dad will say.

“Thank you!” you’ll shout. Then you’ll hug him. Everything will seem okay but he’ll die knowing what your opinion of him is.

Happy Your Dying Dad Wants To Talk About “Inception” Day!

Bottle Of Live Bees Day!

Your new roommate left a bottle of live bees on the kitchen counter with a note that reads, “This bottle of live bees is mine! No one should eat or otherwise make use of any of my live bees! I know exactly how many bees are inside and how deep the aerated cork is inserted into the neck of the bottle. Sharing a living space is about respect so please respect me and my bees. Also I threw out your yogurt. -Joan”

Spend a good hour writing Joan a strongly worded response letter explaining how throwing out your yogurt constitutes a violation of your personal surroundings and kind of amounts to assault. You’re only going to be roommates for so long so you might as well go apeshit on each other in insane kitchen notes while you can.

Happy Bottle Of Live Bees Day!

Your Cat Made Dinner Day!

Today you’ll be surprised when you come home to find a romantic dinner for two waiting for you on the table. 

“Did you make this, Mr. Paws?” you’ll ask your cat.

“Yeah,” your cat will say. “I think I fucked up the sauce a little.”

“I’m sure it’s just delicious,” you’ll say as you take off your coat and sit down at the table.

Mr. Paws will pour you some wine and then sit down with you. You’ll start eating right away.

“You’re home a little late,” Mr. Paws will say.

“Not this again,” you’ll say as you stuff lamb into your mouth.

Mr. Paws will throw his fork on the plate. “No, this again, dammit! I slave away all day making you dinner, I don’t deserve a phone call telling me you’ll be late?”

“You can’t answer the phone! Remember? There’s a reason I didn’t name you Mr. Opposable Thumbs!”

“That’s not my point.”

“What is your point then dammit,” you’ll shout. Your fork will fall off your plate and onto your skirt. “Great, now this has to go to the cleaners.”

“Poor you!” your cat will yell. He’s starting to cry now.

“You know I could have you put to sleep,” you say. “Just take you to a shelter and say I’m done with you. It’s totally legal.”

“You’re a monster!” Mr. Paws will scream, running from the table to cry into his cat bed.

“You’re right. This is the saltiest fucking sauce I’ve ever eaten!” you’ll shout at his retreating tail.

Finish eating the meal and then go in and apologize before he takes out his anger on the upholstery of your easy chair.

Happy Your Cat Made Dinner Day!