Juliana Hatfield has finished fooling herself forever, baby.

Ever since the former Blake Baby released Hey Babe, Hatfield fans knew how cool she was even while listening to her drown in a self-esteem abyss.

Now, Miss Self-Deprecation teams up with new drummer Todd Philips and bassist Dean Fisher as the Juliana Hatfield Three for Become What You Are. She finally admits that she ranks up there among the coolest chicks in existence.

She and her buds reach a higher plane of nirvana for an album less premenstrual and more punk than Hey Babe.

Hatfield wakes up, smells the coffee and realizes that testosterone and its messy by-products aren't the only thing in the universe.

In songs like "Addiction" and "Feelin' Massachusetts," Hatfield perfects brand new cravings like really cool people, hard things to eat, and being alive again.

While she previously kicked in mirrors and then lamented her loneliness, she now actually revels in her independence. "Take a look and see/how alone and free/anyone can be/just never let 'em see you sweat" in "Little Pieces" are her first shaky steps after her metamorphosis from woman scorned into some kind of goddess of spunk.

In "Supermodel," the Sassy magazine cover girl uses her hopscotch voice to criticize the images that taught her the meaning of inadequacy.

"My Sister" is made up of guitar chords that pull each others' hair one minute and the next minute fiercely stick up for each other forever.

Become What You Are is a quirky album, filled with sporadic fits of anger, ecstasy, and, most refreshingly, confidence.

Hatfield wraps up her parade calmly insisting "I Got No Idols," the album's final track.

Don't get me wrong, Hatfield hasn't forgotten that boys exist, but now she sees what the good ones were put on this earth for -- to make you laugh, to come outside and play with you, to play spin the bottle.

In a way that is most becoming, my nominee for Sassiest Girl in America leaves the self-deprecation behind, gets some self-esteem and learns to blame bad stuff on everybody else the way a good sister should.