Thursday, July 24, 2008

Why "Prefers Her Fantasy Life"

Three high-maintenance handfuls, a hyperactive black lab, a husband addicted to eBay, a propensity for alliteration, the reason is obvious. This post is about how I came up with the title for my bloggy world.

As a writer, I have won a few awards. I hate to brag, but I scored a silver award from the Council on Foundations, an investigative journalism award from Parenting Publications of America, and the Guinness Toast award from Mickey Finn’s Pub (prize was a tall, velvet Guinness hat, good for snowmen).



But my most cherished award is from my KnowledgeWorks editor, Linda. It’s a smallish plastic trophy with a sticker on one side that reads ‘best telling detail’ and on the other side, ‘most disregard for spelling of names.’



It’s not that I have a disregard for spelling. It’s that I can't f-ing do it have some sort of impairment.

Case in point—I had reservations with some of the names I came up with for this blog, so I bribed my editor with jewelry asked my editor to vote for one of the following:

The Clogging Blogger (in a word, queer)
Crazed and Confused (taken)
Writer, Wife, Mom, Drunk (I was trying to get away from the wife thing)
Harried With Children (didn’t want to limit my blog to straight people)
Midlife-ing It (didn’t want to limit my blog to old people)
Suburban Subversive (seemed too difficult to say under the influence)

Linda said she liked Suburban Subversive. So I checked to see if the name was taken and yeah!!! it wasn’t.

I was now the Suburban Subversive!!!!

And this Suburban Subversive neglected her family for a day and a half painstakingly created a profile on the site. It read like this:

I’m not really a subversive. I just like to stick it to the man every once in a while. You see:

…I’m the one in elementary school who raised her hand and asked the ‘If there is a God, then why’ question

…the one in junior high school who got sent to the principal’s office for wearing a bare midriff

…the one in high school who refused to say the Pledge of Alliance during my Honor Society induction

… the one after high school who hitchhiked out west with her best friend and then a year later, moved to Venice Beach with her boyfriend

…Now I drive a mini-van. With a peace sticker on the bumper



And so on and so forth.

For days, I googled my subversive site and admired my new blog description box. I couldn’t, however, post anything because there was no manual called ‘Layout for Dummies’ handy. I wasted five f-ing hours and drank four beers messing around with page layout and photos. No f-ing luck.

Before bed, I googled my blog again and this time another Suburban Subversive came up.

What the F--K!! (isn’t it silly to do that when everyone knows the word is fuck?)

What the F—K!!

I THOUGHT I WAS THE SUBURBAN SUBVERSIVE.

Where’s my blog?

And who is this other subversive?

Is she as cool as I am?

This must be a mistake.

I then navigated back to my dashboard and linked onto my blog that way. And guess what? I discovered I was the Surburban Subversive.

Surburban with an extra R!!

So it’s really no joke, I can’t f-ing spell, and I have an award and a now defunct blog to prove it.

So what did I do? I calmly swigged another beer and downed a double dose of Paxil changed the name to ‘Prefers Her Fantasy Life.’ You know, like a fantasy life where I can spell (but I don't have to because John and I have people to do that for us).

And truth be told, it may be for the best. Suburban Subversive could scare the likes of NPR or Oprah from knocking on my door.

And really, ‘Prefers Her Fantasy Life’ would look nice on a t-shirt, don’t you think? With maybe a Lloyd Dobler finger puppet on the back.

And now my fantasy life is about ready to get kicked off the front page at Humor-Blogs, so if you prefer it or if you prefer Bee's fantasy life or even your own, VOTE for this post at Humor-Blogs.

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm so glad you aren't Suburban Subversive because I would have probably never started reading you. That name sounds a little scary actually. Your name is absolutely PERFECT!!

PS I'd buy the shirt.

Anonymous said...

Oh and I am tagging you for a meme. Do you do those or are you too much of a subversive (am I even using that correctly?) to play along.

I think this one is perfect for you:

http://dailymishmash.com/2008/dream-date/

Suzie said...

I cant spell either. But i kept loosing my first few blogs. Forgot their names the passwords where they were housed. I tried at least four times until it stuck. Now mine has lots of easy words to spell excpet for the word backwarts

JD at I Do Things said...

I would totally buy a "Prefers Her Fantasy Life" T-shirt with or without Lloyd finger puppet.

You could've embraced the misspelling and been "The Surburban Surbvursive" . . . ?

I think it was meant to be. Your blog name is awesome.

And congrats on all the awards!

JD at I Do Things

Matt said...

Good thing you changed the name...I would have googled "suburban pervert" looking for your blog...and probably found other interesting things along the way.

Meg said...

Jen - Is that one with a plunging neckline?

Suzie - All my passwords are the same. If someone steals my identity, I figure they can acquire my debt.

JD - Feel free to spell for me.

Hypocritical One - Not suburban Purr-vert?

Meg said...

Sorry for this shameless self-promotion but...

if you've got a click or two to spare, could you go back to Humor-Blogs and vote for my post? It's all I have left, really.

Nanny Goats In Panties said...

Are you hesitant to say "fuck" out of fear of spelling that wrong too?

:P

Anonymous said...

My sister can't spell either. It sounds like something she would do, but your new name is much better and doesn't sound like some eco-terrorist.

Lisa @ Boondock Ramblings said...

Hey! What is my brother doing slamming me on someone else's blog? Man, what a jack...er...butt.

Have to watch my language these days because I'm so afraid my son is going to grow up with a potty mouth.

Anyhow, I agree with Jen...I might not have wandered over here either with that title. It is kind of scary.

So this title works. Glad you stuck with it.

Anonymous said...

I love the peace sticker on the van...

damon said...

So here we are. Enjoying the hilarity of PHFL because of an 'r'!

You were right though. I can't say Suburban Subversive sober.Try
saying it 5 times real fast. Submersed sumburnum, sunburned summersion, oh hell..you did the right thing.

Meg said...

Nanny Goats - I hesitate to say 'fuck' because not every one has had the desensitization of language that I have after seeing The Vagina Monologues (sp?).

Unfinished - And to think my editor like it!

Unfinished's Sister - I'm staying out of this one.

Sarah - It's my second one--magnetic. The first one was stolen.

Damon - One letter can change your life.

Anonymous said...

I don't blame you for staying out of the fight between my sister and me. I wouldn't like to see you get hurt. ;) Hey, but she came over here, and hopefully voted for you.

Re: comment on my blog: about the boob thing working for me: uh, yeah...however, I'm really hoping to highlight other much funnier boobs, I mean, bloggers from Humor-Blogs, and also eventually quit picking on them them. For now, it's working. :)

Meg said...

But with those Humor-Bloggers there's so much to pick on.

Anonymous said...

LOL. Can't spell either. So, you know, spell check doesn't help because they give me OPTIONS to pick for the correct spelling.

Hopped over from Megs blogroll post. Love the surburban subversive story, but love the blog name you finally settled on.

Bee said...

In my fantasy life, I have two obedient dogs and an obedient husband. Nah! I'd settle for a Corona with a slice of lime.