1. Me
2. My lil sister (a distant yet respectable second)

I just found this online …

Makes me slightly more inclined to jello wrestle on Sunday night.

… for my next adventure in jello wrestling.  Seeing as I’m still in my pajamas, spent four hours writing my next alumni notes column, and am not currently at the wrestling instructions going on right now at Don Hill’s, I won’t be wrestling tonight.

And now, I make some BBQ chix and plan out my outfits for the week.

Just when the random communiques from New York Press-reading ex-lovers dribbles to a halt, another Jello Wrestling Sunday comes ’round the mountain.

The alumni of Yale University may be one of the most utterly absurd groups of human beings in existence. … this is not a dull group of people.

(With at least one exception.)

I might unveil a new character (Cambodian Jungle Grrl) this Sunday March 11th at Don Hill’s.

And thanks to all y’all who gave me web propas on your web properties:

• Cait
• Jay
• Bree
• Alecia
• Ari

(Kudos also due to Aleeeece who tipped me off to Mawkery.com.)

On the shopping list for April:

When your inner tigress roars, slip into our elegant Tigress robe-silky, sensuous, and sophisticated. Polyester. (emphasis mine)

Ooooh yeah…

Would love to see you in the crowd if you can make it.  Or better yet — come wrassle!
(True story: the great core-strengthening workout that jello wrestling offers kinda makes me want to grapple for reals.)

Pick up a copy of this week’s New York Press and you’ll see the ANP gumline in all its glistening glory.

Jerry Portwood, the Arts & Entertainment Editor, clearly gets it when he writes:

(Amateur Female Jello Wrestling founder Dana) Sterling has successfully created a space that gives women permission to forget the hassle of deflecting criticism for their bodies’ inadequacies and regress to a time when they felt comfortable being ridiculous.

Of course, by now all y’all are intimately familiar with the fact that I always feel comfortable being ridiculous.

An excerpt from the article:

After losing all her matches (on purpose) in January, ANP decided to return for a second match—although she did have her doubts.

She was feeling “moody and bitchy,” she says, but as a marketing executive at The Bank, she doesn’t get many excuses to suit up and get slippery with a dozen other women. Most days, she’s like other corporate stiffs: sitting in a cubicle, making PowerPoint presentations, working with a sales team. But tonight she doesn’t have to think about shareholders, instead she sheds all inhibitions and becomes The Thaigrr (her mother is Thai and she used to be into the riot grrl scene, she explains). Assuming a brutish, uneducated persona, she speaks with a stereotypical Asian accent and growls; the audience growls back in support.

Unlike many of the others participating this evening, ANP is extremely athletic. She’s 5 foot 10 and currently on an urban basketball league and was on the varsity track and crew team in college. “The kinds of women that are involved here, they were the ones wearing black combat boots and Manic Panic hair dye. This might be a way for them to be a part of something athletic,” she says. “I’m not trying to cultivate this personality of a weirdo. When I heard it was available, and I wouldn’t have to pay for it? I had to do it; it sounded like so much fun.”

But that doesn’t mean that her friends and colleagues don’t look at her like she’s crazy. “My boss said, ‘I thought when you were telling me you were Jell-O wrestling, it was like you were saying you were going to be invisible next week.’ They think it’s bizarre, but how many other opportunities am I going to have to do something this fun?”

Read Jerry Portwood’s full article at:

GIRL FIGHT! The rise of fringe contact sports — for women, by women

Update: Here are my very minor context additions given the difficulty of interviewing and intent-capturing in an otherwise great piece:

• “cultivate the personality of a weirdo” context: I don’t need to cultivate squat. Being a weirdo comes naturally.
• The comment regarding the girls wearing combat boots:
• I wore combat boots in high school
• I rocked some Manic Panic (pink!)
• I was mentioning Jello Wrestling as a great way to let “non-athletic” women enjoy and experience an athletic activity. Celebrating sport and physicality for those who may otherwise have been turned off to it — much in the way that the woman in the roller derby party says she couldn’t deal with a coach telling her what to do, etc.
• Was also quoted incorrectly, because that’s not quite what I said… I started it with “Perhaps the kinds of women …” and I was referring to all the fringe sport grrrls, not just the jello wrestlers.

All this addenda because my little sister just informed me that I come off as “bitchy” in the article. Shit! Moody and bitchy, okay.

But judgmental bitchy! That just cannot stand.

True story: jello wrestling once a month (in conjunction with yoga once or twice a week) has improved my weekly basketball game. I’m:

• More confident taking my outside shots, and as a result they’re more likely to go in
• More comfortable plowing through picks and otherwise using my body as a tank underneath
• Actually nicer to the other team (asking them if they are all okay after a loose ball, etc.)

I was kinda weirded out right after Sunday night, but wrestling is like lifting weights in all directions for 3-5 minutes at a time. After five matches, you can bet I’ve had a great workout.

And my weight? Headin’ back up to the land of 160s. Let’s hear it for muscle density!

And I can’t stop wrasslin’ just because of one dude. That would just be wrong!

New pics have been posted.

Go here to see ‘em.

And mark your calendars: Sunday, March 11, 2007. I think I’m going to unveil a new character.

Suggestions?

I know, I know. Hard to wrap your mind around. But even a bad-ass like me can need a little suntin suntin to get her jello on.

Thaigrr’s Get Ready to Lumber Mix:

• Aerosmith’s Sweet emotion
• Clap Your Hands Say Yeah’s The skin of my yellow country teeth
• The Killers’ Mr. Brightside
• Madonna’s Hung up
• The Magnetic Fields’ Strange powers
• Scissor Sisters’ I don’t feel like dancin’ (video)
• Daedelus Like clockwork springs
• Dr. Dre The day the niggaz took over
• Gnarls Barkley’s Crazy
• Gorillaz’ Dare
• Jane’s Addiction’s Been caught stealing
• Jungle Brothers‘ Simple as that

I’ve got some narsty “rug” burns, and my muscles are so sore that (a) I couldn’t fall asleep last night without my own personal velvet hammer that is sweepytime Advil (b) I was too stiff to make it to the office. (Thank God for call-in numbers.)

But enough about me.

What songs do you listen to when you wanna get pomped op?

I’ve been a mite disappointed with Zappos as of late, having not been compelled enough by their wares to make a purchase in nearly four months (although these would be the perfectly amusing complement to my housecoat for my upcoming Aruba trip). Meanwhile, Amazon’s Endless is endlessly bo-ring, with approximately four pairs of Naturalizer shoes and white puffy New Balance sneaks available to women with size 12 feet.

So, having just plunked down $300 for some shoes at Nordies (hello, love) –

Has anyone tried the Steve Madden make-your-own-shoe experiment? I think the Lamore or the Lusta would look hot in a deep red patent, but I noted that the Steve Madden store in Soho lacked swatches and I can’t tell how the wood heel options would match. Also, I don’t know how their 12 will size, and there are no returns (understandable, but for $150 …).

I will say, having big feet is slightly annoying, especially when you see all the deep discounts available to women with smaller under-standings. But then I can’t get too mad — yesterday I scored a pair of skinny size 29 Joe’s Jeans from Anthropopo for $19.99. (With thanks to Louis @ Coco & Delilah for turning me into a tight pants wearing whore. Next stop: Camel Toe, New Jersey. Who has the Vagisil?)

In other news, I kinda don’t want to do jello wrestling tonight. I’d rather curl up with my laptop and write, which I have been diligently avoiding all weekend along.

I mean, I’ll be there, tiger print outfit and ready to lumber.  (P.S. Don’t wash your jello goo getup with your other clothes — esp. dark ones — unless you want goo all over everything.)  But I’m going to have to psych myself up to git the job done.

Warning: This post is aggro.

So yesterday I check out the YAAMNY website. While there, I decide to post a blurb about jello wrestling, since the chick who owns Stain in Williamsburg keeps promoting her stuff there and some slumlord in Elmhurst is trying to charge jacked up rent. If these bozos are posting stuff, I’ll add my two cents. Spice things up a bit.

My post might get deleted by the God of YAAMNY so I’ll include the copy here:

Women’s Jello Wrestling
February 11, 2007 8:00pm-10:00pm
Don Hill’s
The Feminist Fight Club hosts a night of Amateur Female Jello Wrestling downtown, including THAIGRR, the jello wrestling alter ego of me (JE’99). Prepare to be abused. I mean, amused.

Posted By: ANP

Short, to the point, and it’s not like I’m selling tickets like all the theatre momos promoting their plays, and it’s not like I’m selling wine like Ms. Stain Bar. And I indicate my class year and college affiliation — stuff that most bozos off the street wouldn’t know about. You’d need to be in Da Club (yo, root canals is MAD EASY, yo!) to drop it like that.

Get back home tonight and there’s an email that transports ANP straight (back) to crazy-person land:

Hello ANP,

I just saw your yaamny post. Please confirm your year and Yale Affiliation or I’ll have to delete the post. In addition if you could expand on your post and include a bit more info to make it both informative and make sure it doesn’t look like spam that would be much appreciated.

Happy jello fighting.

best regards,

The Ass Munch a.k.a. The Self-Appointed YAAMNY president

If you’ve ever seen Jonathan Ames do his hoary call, that’s the noise I made on the inside when I read this email. Only, an angry version.

The email infuriates me on many levels. Allow me to divulge:

• This dude is supposed to be a Yale grad. One would assume that he WOULDN’T BE AN IDIOT. Clearly, I’m an ass.
• MY YALE AFFILIATION IS INDICATED BY THE JE’99 PORTION. WHAT PART OF JE’99 DO YOU NOT UNDERSTAND?
• Expand on my post? You mean, make it long and unwieldy like the other mongoloid posts cluttering up the boards? I’m sorry, but I’m an ONLINE MARKETING EXECUTIVE and I like my info SHORT AND SWEET. To the POINT. If they want more info they can CLICK THROUGH (no click left behind, my friends) to the WEBSITE that I have HYPERLINKED TO.
• SPAM? I’m sorry, when was the last time you read SPAM that was punny? Clever? Grammatically correct? And didn’t try to MAKE MONEY off of you?!?!
• Who the fuck appointed YOU King of New York Yale Alumni? I didn’t vote for your ass. And I’m reminded all over again of jack-a-napes IASMH self-appointed God. Shit, a “man” puts up a pizza box server and some klugey ass code and a .net domain suddenly thinks he’s God. Man, I’d set up my OWN damned website on principle if I had the friggin’ time!

(Clearing throat; switching to aristocratic voice.) Yes, quite. So, abandoning the all caps and creative punctuating from my inner monologue, I fire back my pissy email reply, which is entirely childish and yet entirely indicative of my annoyed mood:

Prez. YAAMNY -

Feel free to delete it if you’d like, since between my duties as class secretary, a member of the asian american yale alumni, a member of the yale crew alumni, an interviewer for yale, and a member of WISER (women varsity athlete alumnae) i don’t have time to make it look like not spam. if the JE 99 info isn’t enough (how about actually reading the post?) , and if people can’t read, then i don’t want them joining in.

JE. 1999. AS POSTED IN THE POST.

P.S. Your entire email kinda sucks. Since. Actually. You and I have met in person. And I find your entire email insensitive. And mind-boggling. Seriously. When was the last time you saw spam that actually had 1/4 of the personality in my post?

Consider me officially offended by your insensitivity and entirely un-amused. What on earth made you think it was spam? Seriously. As. If.

Annoyed, and I have to get up early and take my car to the shop, and I haven’t written one word for my homework assignment due tomorrow. And And And And

P.S. YAAMNY President for whose first name last name I have built this post to be search engine optimized: EAT IT. Seriously. Why don’t you try READING for a change. Don’t think I’m fooled by your “Happy Jello Fighting” bullshit. Admit it: it boggles your mind that someone with a Yale degree would be so inclined to jello wrestle. Don’t flatter your little .net that anyone’s trolling it in an attempt to spam it with well-crafted event listings.

Skeeriously.

From this week’s PostSecret:

If you’re a lady in the NYC area and you agree with this sentiment, then join me The ThaiGRR and jello wrestle in Dana Sterling’s fabulous feminist fight club.

If you just want to watch The ThaiGRR jump into a pool of jello, well, then, you can come too.

Sunday, February 11th, 2007
Amateur Female Jello Wrestling

at Don Hills
511 Greenwich Street (& Spring Street)
take 1/C/E train to Canal or C/E train to Spring
8pm show - 6:30pm “Wrestle Lesson”

Admission - Free if you Wrestle
$3 for girls who choose not to wrestle.
$7 boys who come with girls.
$15 for single guys (Get it? Bring a girl.)

Pictures from the January event

Time for some cleans & jerks. (Whilst sporting my housecoat, of course.)

Previously: The ThaiGRR’s re-cap of her debut