A Farewell to Adam: A fucked up roommate

Ok. Maybe fucked up is an exaggeration, but you were weird.

A word of advice Adam, or anyone reading this, please disclose to people (roommates) you are moving in with if you smoke weed. I am not personally against smoking weed, in fact, I enjoy it myself from time to time. However, I have found that it is courteous and considerate to inform the people you are moving in with that you smoke, in case they have a problem with it.

As I said, I personally do not, but I definitely do not like it smoked inside my house. Adam decided to rent a room in my house six months ago. He did not disclose that he smoked weed, let alone that this is what he does all day. I have learned my lesson about asking roommates for three pay check stubs and making sure I rent to someone who either has a full time job or works close to full time at ONE job.

This is because I have found that “freelancers” are really just people: a.) living off unemployment, meager savings, or money from parents b) people who hardly ever work and sit at home alot c) people who become lazier with each day they do not work

Now does this go for every freelancer, of course not. I have rented to several aspiring actors who worked their asses off waiting tables or even worked as escorts! However in my recent unlucky L.A. experience, I have found that a lot of people come to L.A. with the intention to be able to tell everyone back home that they are working as an “artist” in L.A when in reality

a) their parents are paying their rent while the occasionally drive for “Lyft”

b) they had a gig and are living off the fumes of their savings, too proud to get a serving job

With this recent string of roommates I have had, most of them sat at home ALL day, watching tv, watching Netflix, “painting” or smoking weed.

In Adam’s case, it was smoking weed. ALL day.

Adam presented himself as an aspiring actor, having come to LA from the east coast, motivated to make it big. He even showed a clip of him on a tv show where he was a background actor and he also flashed us his SAG card, a privilege he assured us.

In the six months that he lived with us he worked about six gigs, each one about 12 hours in length. Other than that, he would wake up at about 8 am to play video games with his brother on the east coast, then he would go out to our back patio for a about two hours to smoke weed and read. Then he would go back to his video games, then back to the patio for two hours for smoking and reading. This is what he did all day. Back and forth, back and forth.

He smoked so much weed, a trail of Eau de Cannabis followed him everywhere like the Peanuts character Pig-Pen. We would joke that all he ever did was sit out in the back patio, but over time I started to see him less and less in the back patio. He resided mostly in his room and though he swore he never smoked in the house, the smell of weed crept out from under his door and assaulted anyone walking into his room.

This definitely bothered me. I don’t mind occasional smoking in my house, but Adam smokes a bowl every two hours. He is so addicted, we once took him to a two hour long comedy show which ran a half hour late. We could see him becoming antsy and irritable. He even declined going out with us after because he needed to get back home to smoke.

Adam occasionally works nights driving for Lyft, completely stoned, which is hilarious. But other than leaving the house occasional nights to drive, he very rarely left to do anything social. He brought a girl over once in six months, we never saw her again. He brought a creepy, equally stoned friend over a few times to play pool a few times. Other than that he very rarely left the house. I believe he was actually unable to enjoy normal social situations unless he could freely smoke. I’m sure this had something to do with why he rarely booked acting gigs..it was too difficult to smoke on set.

I sometimes wonder what he will do when he needs to get a full time job, how he will function.

Over time I also noticed him becoming more and more distant and irritable. He would always chose to eat outside (so he could smoke of course) and never in the house around the roommates. If he left the house, he never said bye, never said good morning, a bad upbringing perhaps?

All I know is I eventually tired of seeing a 27 year old teenager sitting in my backyard smoking weed all day, practically rolling his eyes if I asked if he could take out the trash. It began to irritate me that this dude never left the house. In almost six months I was home alone maybe twice.

At one point we were friends on Facebook, and when he would actually have a gig he would post a picture of himself on set and caption the photo: “Tell me about you 9-5job again?”

I wanted to add a comment saying: “Yea, tell them about your awesome bustling acting career in LA where you sit in someones backyard all day smoking weed reading graphic novels.”

Anyway, I wonder what will happen to this guy…

Don’t be a DumbBitch

 

 

Yesterday I met with my very good friend Jen for lunch. Jen is a straight up go-getter. She works in production for the music industry and hustles for all of her gigs. She travels the world with bands and is pretty much always busy.

Jen is also super organized and intelligent. Her time working in production which is pretty much dominated by men has left her somewhat boyish but in a cute way. She is definitely feminine just in a tom boyish im-not-gonna-do-my-hair kind of way. Interestingly I believe her time working with men has left her more assertive, which is great!

My point is she is a pretty bad ass bitch. But that doesn’t change that she can be a doormat like anyone else. She was married a few years ago, for almost ten years. During one of her gigs, Jen fell for one of her co-workers, Brian, who was on her nuts and said he loved her. Once she went back home to her “normal” life with her husband, Jen realized she was no longer happy being married.

She got a divorce, moved out with a friend, and decided to pursue things with Brian. Jen and Brian had a few months where they were home and were able to get to know each other off the road. But it quickly became apparent to Jen that the relationship was different when they weren’t on tour working.

Brian suddenly seemed a lot less interested and committed. Jen would go visit him at his apartment in West Hollywood, they would have sex, and then he would say something like “I need my space”. He started to become more aloof and would blow off Jen for friends pretty often. This eventually turned into Brian telling Jen he wasn’t ready for a relationship although their “relationship” consisted mainly of Jen going over to have sex with him then leaving in the morning.

Jen was obviously hurt by this and it took her a while to get her self-esteem back. She couldn’t understand what had changed and why. Brian chased her like crazy at work, but then when they were off the road he had almost no interest in her. And she had given up her marriage for him!

At one point Jen had invited me to work as a runner for a famous band for which she worked as the tour manager’s assistant. To say it was mostly men on the production team is an understatement. They were chain-smoking grungy metal-head looking teddy bears. Most of them were very cool, I’m just trying to paint the picture here. The few women working on the team were butch lesbians or equally beat up metal-head looking older women. In the midst of all this masculinity, Jen’s tom boyishness vanished and she resembled more of a babe.

I believe that this is what Brian saw. Being on the road for months can get lonely, and naturally, you bond with your co-workers. Jen was the most attractive and feminine looking chick of the bunch (to a straight guy). Outside of this world and back in normal work-out-everyday and starve yourself L.A., Jen was not so hot to shallow Brian. So they eventually broke up and she went back to being single. He never called her, except once, drunk. She fell for it and went to visit him. Jen listened to him talk about how he missed her and had made a mistake breaking up with her. So they had sex that night, she left in the morning, and he never called her again.

Just to prove my theory about Jen’s relative hotness; Jen and Brian ended up on tour together again a few months and sure enough, Brian was back to chasing Jen and telling her how much he loved her and had missed her. She was over the moon and when they came back to L.A. Brian moved into Jen’s apartment.

When Jen and I would catch up she would gush about how they wanted to get married and had even decided against having children. Jen was also comittiting what I like to call #DumbBitch mistakes. #DumbBitch mistakes usually consist of any actions which make you a doormat such as:

-not speaking up when your bf is doing something you don’t like

-letting him do whatever he wants, aka being inconsiderate

-waiting at home for him like an idiot all the time while he is out with his friends

-making him your priority when you are clearly not his

-encouraging his douche bag behavior by trying to a “cool girlfriend”

-Trying to be a “cool girlfriend” is the worst DumbBitch mistake you can make next to helping your man get a prostitute.

-“cool girlfriends” generally never look through their man’s phone because “cool girlfriends” believe this makes them look insecure. No it doesn’t. It makes you look like a tool that is too insecure to assert herself for fear of her man walking out on her. If you act like a tool…you will be used like one. Men can sniff out this insecurity on a woman and will use it against her. Every single “cool girlfriend” I know has been cheated on.

Back to Jen. Jen was making the DumbBitch mistake of being a “cool girlfriend”. How? She confided in me that he had been out one night until four a.m. getting drunk with his friends (which he did a lot) and she waited up for him until he got home and then had sex with him. Oooo, I thought. You just reinforced his selfish behavior with sex. No Bueno.

Jen didn’t see it this way. She thought this was being a “cool girlfriend.” Showing she didn’t mind if he was out having fun with his friends. To Jen, having sex with Brian when he came home super late showed how confident she was. Don’t get it twisted ladies. Men think you’re an idiot if you do this.

It’s amazing how many women I know who do this. So many women believe that because men love porn, and all of the women in porn are brainless bimbos with no physical boundaries or self-respect, normal women should also act this way in order to be attractive.

Men love porn because those women allow them to live out society driven fantasies of male domination. Men don’t want to marry these women. They want to watch them, masturbate, and get on with their day.  Men do not respect women who do porn. Those women are just bodies to them. Is that how you want your man to see you?

Anyway after Jen tells me about she was being a “cool girlfriend” I got worried especially with Brian’s track record, but I didn’t say anything. Two weeks later there was trouble in paradise. I met with Jen for lunch and she told me Brian had told her he was no longer attracted to her. “After two weeks?” I said, “That’s shit that happens decades after being together and someone letting themselves go.” She couldn’t understand it, she felt that she was doing everything right. She did everything he wanted her to do..watch porn together during sex and have sex with him when he would come home late. (Not to mention be on the phone texting him like a tool the entire time she was out with her friends).

There you go ladies. Act like a brainless bimbo with no self-respect or personal boundaries and that’s how your man will treat you. Sure, you can act like a DumbBitch and catch a guy for a while, even get one to marry you. But he will be looking at women behind your back and talking about them, if he isn’t doing this in front of you. And if he doesn’t eventually cheat on you and leave you, he will stay with you letting his eyes wander while you do some DumbBitch thing like pop out babies in order to distract yourself from how pathetic and sad your relationship is.

By the way, my friend Jen is convinced that Brian will eventually see the error of his ways. I almost throw up when I hear her say this. He is still technically living with her but they are not together. He is traveling a lot for work which keeps him out but he also chooses to stay with his friends when he is back in L.A. He tells Jen he still loves her, but he hasn’t seen her in months. Okay, he did twice. After he called her drunk telling her he wanted to come over because he missed her. He came over, they had sex, and he never called her again.

DumbBitches don’t learn. Being a DumbBitch will make you, well, dumber. So don’t make it a habit ModernBitches.

My tips for finding a good Roommate

There are a few things I have learned from renting the rooms out in my house to roommates. In this blog post I am going to share my advice:

 

1. Always and I mean always ask to see their last 3 paystubs. I used to skip this step because it made me uncomfortable to look at someone else’s finances and I learned the hard way that this is a very necessary evil. Trying to be nice and polite got me 5 roommates thus far who didn’t work. Three of them lied about having a job when their parents were paying their rent and what I got was overgrown children watching TV in my house all day. One had money “left over” from a project he did, watch out for these people. These people call themselves freelancers but what they are is proud and lazy. Another also lied about having a job when he was living check to check from money he received from the V.A. and when he wasn’t spending the little he had on alcohol, he was paying his rent late.
2. Judge a book by its cover. In my experience I have found that if someone looks messy and as if they don’t care about their appearance, its because they are messy and they will not care about the appearance of your home. Now this is a controversial one, but it has proven to be true every time- if the person is fat and I mean really overweight you can bet that its because they eat a lot and are just overall slobs. People who have really poor diets will naturally have other bad habits that go along with their sedentary lifestyle. Like sitting at home a lot watching T.V. and being lazy about cleaning. Also watch out for these people if there are shared bathrooms because they will be in there A LOT trying to pass their unhealthy stools.
3. Anyone who is late on your first meeting is incredibly self-absorbed. I rented twice to two people who were late to come see the room and didn’t bother to call me to let me know they would be late, I had to call them. I knew it was a red flag when it happened and I kicked myself in the ass when it was confirmed that their lack of punctuality was just a side effect of their selfishness. People who are late to meet you for something they scheduled are plain inconsiderate and they seek to attract people who allow them to be this way, don’t fall for it. Both of them were girls of course. Now I am a feminist so it pains me to say this, but she was the biggest most self-absorbed airhead ever and…she turned out to be an escort. She was late because she was an airhead. Let me finish. She would constantly lock herself out because “she forgot her keys inside” and call me hysterical nearly demanding that I drop whatever I was doing regardless of where I was to come home and open the door for her. She would also leave the stove and oven on……um that was scary. Point is someone who isn’t worried about making a first good impression will NEVER make a good impression on you.
4. Active people are the best to rent to. If you’re anything like me and abhor a couch potato in your home (see number 1) and chose to rent to a fit-looking person. Not attractive, fit. Go ahead and ask them what their hobbies and interests are. Get a feel for their day to day. Someone who says they like to hike or run a few times a week is great. This means they have more energy and are out of the house more.
5. Rent to a 9-5er. There is no better way to ensure that your roommate won’t be sitting in their room all day then to (see number 1) and make sure that they work a set schedule. Watch out for any “freelancers” this is usually code for “I refuse to get up at 8 a.m. everyday and I don’t mind living off of pennies.”
6. Protect yourself with a clause in the lease about overnight guests. In my case, I rent out rooms in a home I own. The rent I collect does not cover the mortgage. I pay more than each roommate does to live in the home, not including utilities (which I do not charge them), wifi & cable, furnishing of the entire house with my furniture, and any maintenance which I pay for. Thus, I do not feel it is fair to allow them to have guests over as much as they want. Why? They don’t pay utilities, they don’t pay for maintenance, and that’s extra people using the wi-fi only I pay for. Watch out for girls. Girls are much clingier than men and will try to move in their boyfriends if you’re not careful. We had a roommate whose boyfriend started to move things in. Um, no. Not under my watch. This isn’t a hotel. Bottom line, the people you rent to will see your home as a hotel. They don’t care if something breaks because they aren’t paying for it, so why let them add a +1 to that equation?

That’s all for now. Please feel free to leave any questions or comments.

-ModernBitch

 

 

How to be a Modern Bitch

Let’s get this straight. I’m not perfect. But I am an avid observer of human nature…and I take notes.

Getting my Master’s in Marriage and Family Therapy has taught me a few things. I read somewhere that people who are more focused on “enduring” in a relationship, in other words, they are the type that:

-would never get divorced

-for a number of reasons only focus on continuing the relationship

These people are less likely to notice if/when their partner is cheating. Now first of all, the other type of partner is more focused on personal happiness. They are more sensitive to their own emotional states as well as their partner’s. Now what this also means is that this type of partner is more likely to, say, get a divorce, because they believe in the importance of personal happiness.

My boyfriend would say that I am the latter and this makes me a selfish person. I beg to differ. I believe that the enduring type “endures” for any number of neurotic reasons. Usually: insecurity, religious beliefs, for their children, pressure from family, etc. I think that is selfish. This type of person basically wants their partner to be on their bandwagon and put up with the relationship if it sucks because “that is the right thing to do”.

I want my partner to be with me because he is happy, not because he doesn’t want to pay alimony, not because its in the best interest of the children, and not because he thinks he can’t do any better.

This type of person is so focused on their own self, they fail to notice the emotions of their partner. This makes the “enduring” type neglectful. They take it as a given that the relationship will always endure, so they fail to check in on their partner and what their partner is really feeling. They are actually focused on themselves.

Thus, this type of person fails to notice or just deliberately ignores when their partner’s behavior changes because they are cheating. Then they cry when they find out because “they didn’t see it coming”.

Let me give you an example. There is a woman I know, let’s call her Cathy. Cathy is very beautiful and at almost 40 years old she can pass for 27. She has a great, fun, personality and after having her two children she got a “mommy makeover” which means a tummy tuck and breast implants, leaving her even more beautiful.

Thing is Cathy was repeatedly molested by her father when she was a little girl. When her mother found out about the abuse, she defended Cathy’s father and stayed with him. She encouraged Cathy to hide this dirty family secret, and to this day Cathy is close with both of her parents and never told her husband about the abuse.

Anyway as you can see, though Cathy appears well adjusted on the outside, she is obviously carrying shame inside. Her mother taught her to “stand by your man” and endure.

Cathy married a guy named Blake that she met in college, and after doing all of Blake’s homework she ended up dropping out while he graduated. They went on to have two beautiful children and appeared on the outside to be an amazing couple. I could see through the cracks.

Cathy completely changed her personality when she met Blake. She adopted all of his likes and interests. Cathy became a huge baseball and football fan like Blake so she could “have fun” with him at the games he went to. I have always joked with my boyfriend that white girls always feel they need to do this. They think they need to be “one of the boys”. It just always seems so tacky and desperate to me. 

I once heard Cathy’s mom defend how her daughter’s interests changed and said it was because it was the only way Blake would talk to her. I thought, why didn’t Cathy just find someone who liked her for who she was? Oh yea, because your husband molested her and Cathy thinks she is a piece of shit deep down inside.

Anyway everyone had their doubts about Blake, everyone except Cathy. Blake would go on “guys trips” and cruises quite frequently with his buddies, leaving Cathy at home with their two children. He would go see a movie once a week “by himself” even though they were broke. I thought..what does Cathy think he is doing when he is on these cruises with his good looking buddies? Does she think he rebuffs all the twenty-somethings who are talking to him and his friends? Does she think he politely tells them that he would rather not party and drink with them because he has a wife and two kids at home? Nah….And anything he wanted to do, Cathy would let him do it without a word of protest.

I remember telling my boyfriend, how does their relationship work? He is always going out with friends. See the thing is Blake was really good looking and kind of douchey…bad combo. I often wondered if Cathy got her mommy makeover because Blake made her feel badly about herself. If I had a boyfriend that good looking, or that shallow I wouldn’t let him out of my sight, but then I stay away from really good looking douchey guys for that reason. See I am not focused on enduring and I never bought into the whole “let your man do whatever he wants or he will leave you” crap. From my observations, if you let your man do whatever he wants..he will leave you or atleast cheat on you because he knows you are going to stay with him anyway.

See men are not raised like women. Women are socialized to be more thoughtful, more modest, more considerate. Men are not. So if you don’t tell your man to be more thoughtful, more modest, and more considerate he won’t be.

Women in the U.S. have bought this bullshit idea that asking your man to respect you this makes you insecure or controlling. Really? Last time I checked, having the balls to ask for what you want makes you assertive. But again, assertiveness is frowned upon in women.

Don’t believe that bullshit ladies. If you feel uncomfortable with something your man is doing TELL him. It’s the only way he will respect you. And if he doesn’t care about your feelings, tell him to get lost. Being single is better than being with someone who makes you feel insecure.

Back to Cathy. I predicted Blake would cheat on her and he did…with her best friend. He went up to Cathy one morning and said “I’m leaving you”. He had his stuff packed and he left to live with a friend.

Cathy “didn’t see it coming”. I thought, how do you not see your man straight up leaving you and your two kids?  No one decides to make that drastic of a change over night. This is why I keep tabs on my man’s phone, email, etc. Because not seeing something like that coming means you’re not doing your homework.

As women we have been brainwashed into believing that we should check up on our cars before we check up on our man so that men can have their cake and eat it too. I have had so many friends (who were eventually cheated on) tell me that looking through my boyfriend’s phone means I don’t trust him. I trust him, otherwise I wouldn’t be with him, but I don’t trust men blindly. Because as I said before men and women are raised differently. Men are encouraged by society to have a wandering eye, to lie, to sleep with as many women as possible etc etc. and I’m not naïve..why should I think I’m so special my boyfriend won’t act like that?  Women’s definitions of fidelity are generally stricter than men’s definitions. So I do my homework and check up on my man. And guess what? If he really had a problem with it he would have left a long time ago.

Men who get upset when their woman goes through their phone are hiding something. Plain and simple..and douches like that will try to make you feel insecure about yourself by telling you that you’re insecure. Men still have a problem with assertive women because it is more fun for them to have their cake and eat it too. Don’t let a man use you.That makes you insecure. And its time women start being assertive.

-ModernBitch

 

 

What is a Modern Bitch?

A modern bitch is NOT a “modern woman”. Let me explain.

I rejected the term “modern woman” when this chick I can’t stand, let’s call her Tiffany, claimed that she is a “modern woman”.

Let me give you some background on this girl Tiffany. I met her five years ago through my boyfriend. She went to college for her Mrs. Degree. She got her bachelor’s, snagged a well-off husband by playing her cards right (being a doormat), and resigned herself to smoke weed all day and do nothing.

At one time she had a shop that sold trinkets, which I deemed her “hobby” that was funded by her husband. And a year later it closed down. She did nothing for two years thereafter and finally got her husband to agree to get her pregnant and now she is a stay at home mom. I predicted she would get pregnant after her shop closed down so she could have an excuse to not work..and she did.

Worse still, she is a total doormat. Her husband does whatever he wants, to the point that his own mother, Tiffany’s mother-in-law, encourages her to be stricter with him. He was at his “Dadchelor” party while she was at home alone having contractions…he wouldn’t pick up his phone. Worse STILL, her husband is constantly talking about other women, looking at other women, and commenting on how hot his female clients are..all behind her back.

I can’t help but feel that his disrespectful behavior is partly her fault. I wouldn’t respect her either. She is lazy, unambitious and a doormat so that she can have a meal ticket.

So…one day at a wedding I heard an older man ask her if she had changed her last name when she married. Yes, she said, I changed my last name when I got married, but I’m a modern woman. Good, he said, I hate when women do shit like keep their last name.

I almost threw up in my champagne glass.

At this point you have probably guessed correctly that I am totally against taking a man’s last name. As “modern women” we like to say we are equal to men and can do anything a man can do, yet we continue to make the fundamental mistake of accepting our place as second class citizens by taking our husband’s last names and losing our own. If we can do anything men can do, why don’t we keep our last names? Want proof that taking a man’s last name is a submissive act? Ask a man if he would take his wife’s last name in marriage, most men cringe and say, “hell no”. Yea……we have been taught by Disney movies and pretty much any romantic movie to romanticize being a man’s servant. Making him dinner (while still working, at least most of us), grooming him, cleaning the house, etc. This is why most divorced women do not remarry. Traditional women see marriage as an obligation to take care of a man. yet about 75% of divorced men remarry, and why wouldn’t they? With all of these women around who see it as their duty to care for a man and put themselves second until his dying day.

Back to last names…The tradition of taking a man’s last name is hundreds of years old. Women were “given away” by their families and became the property of their husband and his family. Hence, the adoption of his last name and riddance of her own. She no longer belonged to the family who gave her her name. Her duty was to bear children for her new family so that the family property could be passed on (to sons) and the family name could survive (through sons). She was a servant to her husband and to her husband’s parents. This is why men preferred and still prefer younger women. Getting a bride as young as you could get her, sometimes 5-10 years old was beneficial to an older man because this meant his wife would likely outlive him and be alive to take care of him in his old age. While she was destined to die without a partner, likely alone for decades after her husband’s death. Marrying younger women, taking a man’s last name, fathers walking daughters down the aisle these are all romanticized customs that we have forgotten the origins of.

Most people don’t even know why they do these things. But continuing to do them perpetuates our place in society as second to men. Deep down inside we all know its creepy and weird that men prefer younger women, often MUCH younger women, and we have been brainwashed into believing this is “biological”. Yea that makes biological sense for the men, what about the woman? An older man has more resources? Well yea, women were conned through marriage into servitude. I don’t think women getting with older men is a biological preference for resources as much as it is a social adaptation to a societal structure that passes all resources through men and their last names.

Back to Tiffany..after hearing her call herself a modern woman, I completely rejected the term. I am way more radical and forward thinking than she is, I thought, and I can’t call myself a modern woman if chicks like her are throwing that term around all willy-nilly. I need a new term, a term that conveys radical forward-thinking thought. A term that is taboo and scares men (because the reality is that men fear the truly modern woman).

This is how the term Modern Bitch was born.

Like the word nigger, I wanted to take a word that was meant to degrade and compartmentalize women and turn it into an empowering word only women could use.

I’m such a freakin feminist to this day if I hear a man call a woman “bitch” I almost I almost have a heart attack. I have the same visceral reaction people have when they hear a white person call a black person a “nigger”.

So there you are. I am a Modern Bitch. Men hate bitches because it disrupts their internalized ideal of a doormat Betty Croker that gives them hand jobs. My power and strength scares men and they cringe because I go ape-shit if they call me a bitch.

A truly free and modern woman is a modern bitch. Own your bitchiness ladies.