bloggity woggity

It's not you, it's me.

2007-08-21T15:51:00.000-07:00

I've been cheating.
Forgive me - I'm a blog whore.

Day 2: Seven bandaids and counting

2007-05-22T16:05:00.000-07:00

We arrived in London yesterday morning.

Or was it 2 days ago?

Hmm.

Well, at some point in the near past, we flew, like, 73 hours.

Since we've arrived we have probably walked an excess of 200 miles.

This is us after walking approximately 132 miles, right before we walked another 91:

We might look happy, but there are blisters the size of silver dollars on my feet.

Oh the price we pay for acting touristy and stuff.

We have since sterilized the kitchen thoroughly

2007-04-16T18:04:00.000-07:00

Around here I might be known for mentioning a teaser about something I might write on soon.

And then not writing about it.

Not something I’m proud of. But I’m going to claim creative license on this one and just say that sometimes I’m just not in the mood to write about certain things.

Or, I don’t remember. Which could probably qualify as more of a creative amnesia than creative licensing.

In the case where I’m just not in the mood – let me just say I am sparring you. When it comes to writing, if I have to force anything it’s not only painful for me but the reader as well.

That’s assuming I have any readers.

And at the rate I’ve blogged around here – it’s probably safe to say I may have only one left.

Hi Mom.

What I’m getting at in a round about way (me? taking forever to make a point?) is that sometimes I’ve been known to hint at posting a story soon.

And then not.

And then asked to get right on it by what readers I DO have left.

And I still don’t.

Except today? I think I’m going to actually come through on a story tease I made in my previous blog about our hole digging escapades!

Not to be confused with Icecapades.

Yes! That’s right! I mentioned something about poo on the wall – and now? Why yes! I’m going to FOLLOW THROUGH and actually elaborate in a blog today.

Why you ask?

Because I AM IN THE MOOD.

Generally not a moody girl – but when it comes to my writing I most definitely can be.

Which is probably an indication that if I ever wanted to pursue writing as a career (ha!), then becoming an alcoholic may be the best thing for me.

Ok, poo on the wall.

I’m going to try and err on the side of brevity here as I’ve already managed to blather on about god knows what for god knows how long.

Totally unlike me I know.

We had been in our new house for a week or two. Upon moving we had made a few large appliance purchases – one of which was a washing machine.

I, being the very excited ex-apartment dweller, wasted NO time in purchasing laundry equipment as soon as the ink dried on our loan papers. In fact, I was SO excited about NOT having to do laundry in a public laundry room EVER AGAIN, that I had stood protest against our ever growing pile of laundry in the corner of our bedroom.

And I waited patiently for Trevor to find some time to hook up the new washer in our kitchen.

Finally the day came, and our washer was plugged in, hooked up, leveled, and ready to make me one VERY happywife.

About two loads in and the drain started backing up.

Thus begins what would become one of many UNINTENDED projects we would have going on around the house.

Bright and early Saturday we rented a professional snake – something that vaguely resembles a garden hose on a reel. Only the hose is made of metal with pincers on the end, and the reel is powered to whip the hose around in a frenzy similar to a snake prone to seizures.

We set it up in the kitchen, and Trevor began to thread it down the drain pipe until the entire 75 feet of hose had disappeared into the bowels of our sewer system.

He began retracting it and realized quickly that the reel is designed more to encourage a seizure from the hose than actually pull it out and wind it back up again. So with Trevor at the drain opening pulling the hose out of the sewer, and I at the reel feeding the hose back into the apparatus, we slowly retracted the hose out of the sewer line.

I have to admit that by this point we were mostly preoccupied with the anticipation of what we would find at the end of the hose, griped in the metal pincer.

Let me just make it clear – when I say “anticipation”, I don’t mean in an excited sort of way. More like “anticipation” in an *oh god what the hell has been clogging our drain and just how much is it going to make me want to vomit?* sort of way.

About half way into the hose retracting the kitchen took on the smell of a public restroom.

At which point we noticed our gloves were turning brown.

From poo.

Two weeks into home ownership and we were already playing with poo in the kitchen.

(A note to every sicko that typed in “playing with poo” in your internet search tool and got this blog: Sorry to disappoint – and no, there are no pictures.)

We persevered, Trevor continued wrenching the hose from the pipe, I continued shoving it into the reel. Until finally! The end of the hose appeared! And in the pincers?

Nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

Not to sound perverse, but I was really hoping for SOMETHING. Anything that would prove to us that all our efforts had not been wasted.

I looked at Trevor for guidance – a comment that might give me faith that even though the pincers came back empty, there was still hope that whatever the impeding object had been, it was dislodged and traveling down the rest of the sewer pipe.

He looked back at me, and then looked at the wall.

"There’s poo on the wall.”

I turned and looked at the hose reel and there, next to it, was a spray that traveled across the floor and up the wall like a brown rooster tail.

“Um…”

“Gross. Guess we'll be cleaning the kitchen.”

“Yea, that’s not all.”

“What?”

“There’s poo on your leg too.”

So that trail of brown spray that went across the floor and up the wall?

Yea, it traveled across the floor on the other side of the hose reel, and up my leg too.

(2^nd note to Sicko’s: I was wearing pants, and no – I don’t have pics of this either.)

It's not a hole to China...

2007-04-12T17:02:00.000-07:00

"So, the police just called me at work."

"Do you need me to come bail you out?"

"I'll give you one guess why they called."

"Our favorite neighbor doesn't like the trench we just dug in our side yard?"

"Gee. How did you know."

"What did they want exactly?"

"They wanted to know how long the hole is going to be there."

"Tell them it will be there as long as it takes to trick her to fall in."

We bought an old house. A 94 year house to be exact. And it has old pipes to go with all the other things old about the place. This would include the sewer pipes. Given that things were done a bit differently back when the house was built, there is quite a bit of updating that needs to be done on the pipes in order to make the plumbing a little more acceptable shall we say.

I will have to blog about the "poo on the wall story" soon, as I think it will highlight what I'm talking about here quite nicely.

But for purposes of finishing THIS particular story I will summarize:
- sewer pipe got clogged
- we snaked the pipe ourselves
- we got poo on the walls
...and my leg

I think that makes my point.

Moving right along.

In order to update our sewer pipe so it stops backing up, meets code, and appreciates the value of the property, we had to embark on a project known as "replacing the sewer lateral".

Which pretty much means we dig up the whole sewer pipe as it runs from the house to the city sewer line at the street and lay down a new one made out of new! modern! fancy! materials.

On the first day of the project we hired a team to come and remove the concrete path that happens to run over the pipe, and excavate the dirt underneath to expose the area so we could break out the old pipe and lay down the new one.

And because we are not stupid we hung a copy of the permit and a note on the door for the police officer we knew would show up to investigate because a "concerned citizen" was most likely going to call in and complain.

Hence why Trevor was called at work by a cop.

"Did he give you any shit?"

"No, we are completely within our rights. He just wanted to know when we thought we would be done so he could let her know. That and she's freaking out about the dirt on her driveway."

Did I mention that part?

Yeeeeaaaa.

The sewer line happens to run right on our property line next to her, and the space there is VERY narrow.

Which means all the dirt that got excavated? Yea. It's lying on her property next to her precious driveway. Not ON her driveway - she still has plenty of room to back out - just NEXT to her driveway.

Which gives me great pleasure.

We came to find out a few days later from another neighbor that the Crazy old Lady is concerned about the hole that some "weird people" dug in her yard. She was worried that they would never come and fill it back in.

You know...those crazy bands of freaky hole-diggers that roam the Bay Area looking for driveways to trench.

Well, at least she didn't think aliens were involved.

WARNING: Don't go topless on our street

2007-03-14T17:01:00.000-07:00

Things had been pretty quiet on Crazy Lady Lane.

We were settling in to our new abode at a comfortable pace. Crazy Lady next door seemed to be leaving us alone since her attempt at having our car towed.

Overall, things were getting to be quite peachy.

Saturdays around the Russell household usually consists of coffee and breakfast cozied up on the couch in front of a home improvement show. Sort of an early morning pep talk for the rest of the day. Feeling freshly inspired we’ll pull on our grubs and get started on the latest project that has our attention.

Around our house, that could mean any one of 237 projects we currently have going.

And on any given Saturday we could be working on 1 single project.

Or 22.

Because we have what I call PADD.

Or Project Attention Deficit Disorder.

(I self medicate with wine)

I seem to recall that the Saturday that I am slowly getting my story around to, was one of the Saturdays where we had at least 4 things going on.

It was late morning and I was walking out front, probably AWAY from something that was annoying me and in search of either something else to catch my attention, or Trevor – so he could fix it.

Out front I stumbled across Trevor and one of our neighbors.

This was very exciting at the time because up until now we had only briefly met two of our neighbors.

Being the new homeowner that I am I had all these delusions of moving into to our FABULOUS new house and meeting all our FABULOUS new neighbors. We would all become GREAT friends, invite each other over for spontaneous dinners on our patios, drink wine on Sunday evenings, share gardening tips, housesit for each other, and enjoy many a quaint conversations over the fence whilst holding gardening shears mid-prune.

Because pruning the lemon trees is #34 on our project list.

And thanks to PADD, a friendly neighborly conversation over the fence is an excellent way of distracting me from work.

So imagine my dismay when we move in, get ticketed and cited for towing on two separate occasions, and have only managed to get a couple “hi, welcome to the neighborhoods!” in passing in the entire month we had been there.

Granted it was the middle of winter and no one really hangs around outside with wine trying to coax you into their backyard on a Sunday evening with promises of a delicious meal.

Come to think of it, if anyone did that I might turn and run the other way.

Anyway.

What the hell was I getting at?

Seriously. People?

You have no idea what it is like to be me, and to try and blog.

I read and REread my work repeatedly.

And not because I’m anal.

Well, there IS that too.

But what I’m referring to is how many times I reread my work because I have gotten myself so off track that I have to recall what the hell my point was.

Not including all the times I reread my work just to make sure I like what I wrote.

So by the time I’m done with a blog and ready to post, I have in all likelihood read the damn thing at least 12-15 times.

And then I publish it – and go read it physically ON the blog.

And then?

You got it…I find something ELSE wrong and have to go and edit it.

Usually I’ve posted and reposted each one of my blogs at least 3-5 times.

Seriously.

And no, I don’t take any medications.

But hey, some people wash their hands repeatedly.

I’m perfectly happy to just read and read and read and read my work.

OH MY GOD.

NOW I have to go reread what I wrote so I can figure out what the hell I was writing about in the first place AGAIN…

Ok, right.

So Trevor and a neighbor were conversing in our front yard.

Naturally I go and butt in because I’m excited that not only has a neighbor approached us, but he also seems enthusiastic and very friendly.

Definate possiblities for wine schmoozing on Sunday evenings. Or Tuesdays. Or Wednesday, Thursdays or Fridays evening.

Point is, I'm not discriminatory over which night of the week I drink wine. Or schmooze.

Our new neighbor John proved himself to be quite the valuable asset in just the first 10 minutes of making his acquaintance.

Having lived on the street – just 2 houses down from the Crazy Lady – for 10 years, he has quite the load of gossip.

And?

He LOVES to gossip.

We learned many an interesting fact in our first conversation with John.

Crazy Lady was born into the house she currently lives in. Her parents took ill when she was young (probably 20’s) and she was forced to take care of them having been their only child. She never dated, never married, her parents died and she has lived in the house ever since.

(I'm thinking being a virgin has probably caused most, if not all, of her psychosis)

There was some vague recollection about an ambulance having a hard time getting to the house during an emergency that has led to speculation as to why she obsesses about her driveway and cars parked in near proximity.

We suspect she has never even had a job – possibly never even made it off the island.

We learned that she apparently has calmed in her old age. John recalled many times he had been ticketed just for parking on the street – never mind near her house.

When she’s feeling particularly spirited she’ll even throw kitchen scraps on your windshield as a means to convey how she feels about your car being there.

More prodding and we got even more fascinating stories…

Neighborhood kids used to throw a ball around on the street since it’s a quiet cul-de-sac. Until one afternoon 4 cop cars came screeching around the corner with their sirens blaring because apparently she had called 911 reporting that there were “men with daggers” in her yard trying to “stab her”.

We weren’t sure how much credit to give that story until a week later we met another neighbor – he shared a few Crazy Lady stories of his own, including a time he was playing ball with some friends when he was a kid and all these cops showed up because there had been an attempted stabbing reported by the Crazy Lady.

Lastly, John shared with us a time a few years prior that some person visiting a friend on the street had the poor misfortune to not only park RIGHT in front of the Crazy Lady’s house, but in a convertible with the TOP DOWN.

She marched right out front, threw her garden hose in the car, and turned it on.

We have yet to verify that story with any other neighbors, but people?

The bitch is crazy!

We continued to keep a sense of humor about her.

And Trevor never leaves the top down on his car.

The beat we live in.

2007-03-06T16:42:00.000-08:00

Christmas came and went. We had no more cars ticketed, cited abandoned, or towed.

Overall, a good holiday.

Come Tuesday Trevor decided to take advantage of his day off and head over to the police department and see if he could talk to someone there about the recent “issues” we had been having with the crazy old lady.

We thought it might be best to start some sort of record in case we had to push any kind of harassment suit.

Now, keep in mind we have always kept a sense of humor about our neighbor. We are not stressed, freaked out, angry, frustrated, or pissed off.

Life is too short - and seriously? This is pretty freakin' amusing. By the time that I'm writing this (oh, like 2 months after the fact), we actually look for ways to push our limits with the old bitch. I mean, really. We're not going anywhere, she's probably going to live to be 110, so we may as well make this a little entertaining.

But, that being said, we also know how fine a line it is between being annoying in a psychotically eclectic sort of way and being a flat out pain in the ass that’s costing us money.

We know how important it is to make sure your ass is covered when they stop being harmless, and start getting expensive.

We’ve both dated people like that.

So, Trevor headed off to the small town USA police station to file some sort of record with the station and ended up actually talking to the police officer that “runs our beat”.

Yes.

Apparently do we not only have just ONE cop that is in charge of our neighborhood…

But we live in a “beat”.

That’s right.

Very nice guy as it turns out.

A very nice guy that is very familiar with the “woman next door”.

Apparently she makes frequent calls to the police department for a whole litany of reasons. He informed Trevor to “not worry about it”, “she’s harmless”, and we’re “not special, she does this to everyone”.

Oh gosh.

And here I was hoping we were her “special” victims.

Now that I know that she treats EVERYONE like this, I feel used.

So basically, as long as we continue to obey the law, and refrain from parking 6 inches into a red curb, we should be ok.

For the most part that put our minds at ease. What anxiety we DID have about the issue anyway.

But we were not looking forward to the frequent conversations we would be having with the police – scratch that – this one cop guy, because we knew we would soon begin a lot of construction around the house.

And neighbors usually don’t like construction.

And neighbors that already suck and have the police on speed-dial?

Yea.

We were starting to think we should keep a box of donuts and a fresh brewed pot of coffee on hand every weekend.

Abandoned vehicles and crazy math

2007-02-23T16:54:00.001-08:00

I want it clearly on the record that we never actually wanted any ill will upon our neighbor.
A mysterious disappearance would have been welcomed. But we are for the most part GOOD people.
Mostly.
So when the ambulance pulled onto our quiet street, in our quiet town, on our quiet little island, we might have felt a little guilt for all the little snide remarks we had made at our neighbors expense over the past week.
But only momentarily.
I mean, come on! We're not fancy magical people! We didn't MAKE anything happen to her.
But there IS the bird story.
Another blog.
Make a mental note to remind to blog about the bird story.
So an ambulance pulls up outside our house and naturally we went to spy out our window to see what was going on.
As soon as I got to the window to inspect, our crazy neighbor was making her way to the back of the ambulance - fully dressed complete with shawl, handbag, and scarf covering her wily white hair. Within a few moments they packed up into the vehicle, and drove off.
And that was that.
And we, being the new neighbors on the block, knew NO ONE on the street to go and gossip with. By the time I had pulled on my shoes and jacket to go out and see if I could butt in on any sideline conversations occurring on the sidewalk, everyone had already cleared and gone back inside their respective homes.
Trevor and I were left to our own imaginations.
And over the next week, our imaginations had leaped to the most likely scenario - we wouldn't be seeing her again.
Let me illustrate with the following calculation - known as The Relative Law of Pneumonia:
(1 Old lady + 1 ambulance) / # days gone = % chance likely she will return
For example:
1+1 / 7 days gone = 28.5% chance likely she will return
That's science people.
Ok, maybe not.
I may have just made that up.
But I watch NUMB3RS and therefore consider myself a mathematical expert in all things elderly.
You know, I blame this nutty tangent on the coffee.
I am SO tired lately.
Which I blame on the washing machine.
The washing machine that is IN our kitchen and not in the basement.
Where the dryer is.
Make sense?
Yea, I didn't think so either.
Which is why we are building a laundry room in the basement, so the washer and dryer can be united as a laundry collabarating team!
The washing machine and microwave - not a great cleaning duo so much.
But the washing machine and dryer? Much better.
So, in the meantime, on the weekends, I am acting as an assistant contractor to my husband, part drill sergeant, part Nazi.
Hence the coffee.
Hence the weird mathematical chitter chatter.
Hence the awful digression into talking about laundry equipment when I'm trying to stay on the topic of our crazy neighbor and her joy ride in an ambulance.
But at least I haven't broken into rambling directives in German.
Ok, back on task!
So.
Um...
Right, she was gone awhile.
Like, 10 days.
And we were SO sure she wouldn't be coming back. She's old and was taken away by ambulance - my money was on pneumonia and either hospitalization in an old person's home, or death.
I'm not going to sugar coat by the way - I've already veered off topic a couple times already and this blog is taking on great lengths, and finding a more discreet way of explaining that we believed she may have died will just take up more space, and require more effort on my part.
You know, like explaining how I won't sugar coat something takes up time and space.
Exactly like that.
Ahem.
Oh my god. What is WITH the random tangents today?
Let us circle back to the story.
Friday afternoon - the Friday before Christmas - our elderly little neighbor was returned to her house. I must admit I was pretty ambivalent about the situation. At that point in time we hadn't really interacted with her much, and therefore didn't know any better.
Know any better - meaning NOW, retrospectively as I write this, I NOW know better and believe it would have been nicer if she didn't return.
But at that point in time, being ignorant on her CRAZY ways, and being a decent person, I thought it was nice that she didn't die at least.
Even if she did have police on speed dial.
Ok, so remember this: it was late Friday afternoon.
FRIDAY
Got it? You will need to remember this little nugget.
Saturday morning comes, Christmas eve, and Trevor and I were getting a few things in order before we head out of town for Christmas eve dinner...when Trevor discovered his car had been cited as an abandoned vehicle.
His car.
His well maintained, clean, relatively new car.
The car he drove to the ferry terminal the day before.
The car he drives to and from the ferry terminal every day of the week in order to get to work.
Abandoned?
And the citation? Was of the variety reserved for those cars you see on the side of the road, with piles of leaves and garbage accumulating under them, usually of the old and beat-up variety. The very kind of citation that claims the car has been abandoned for more than 72 hours and will be towed and impounded at the owner's expense if it is not moved within 72 more hours.
Upon contacting the 800 # on the citation, Trevor learned a few interesting tidbits of info:
- The parking department was on vacation all week and therefore an officer was dispatched when someone (ahem) called in the "abandoned" vehicle. Therefore, they didn't "know any better" and just cited the car as abandoned.
- The person who called in the citation was "the lady neighbor next door"
So, to recap what happened:
- Crazy lady comes home from hospital at roughly 4pm on Friday evening
- Crazy lady calls parking enforcement Saturday morning, claims Trevor's car has been "abandoned" and asks that it be towed
Now, if we do a little math (bear with me here, this time it's not convoluted), we learn that 72 hours PRIOR to when the car was cited was...Wednesday morning.
Remember that thing about Friday?
3 weeks in our new house at this point and we've learned two valuable lessons about our neighbor:
1) she's very protective about her driveway
2) she's a LIAR
Fortunately our cities parking enforcement department is very understanding and we were let off the hook.
At the time I thought they were just laid back and nice.
But in hindsight?
We now know that they have had PLENTY of experience dealing with the "neighbor lady next door".

How many midget burglars w/poor troubleshooting skills do you know?

2007-02-08T17:25:00.000-08:00

Coffee cup in hand, I was enjoying my first Saturday morning as a home owner. Still in my bathrobe, I had been up maybe 20 minutes and I was in the living room marveling at how nice the sunlight comes into our front two rooms.

Yes.

I’m being serious.

This is what being a homeowner is like in the beginning.

Much like a new romantic relationship, you find incredible enjoyment at the littlest of things. Finding out the heater works? Leaves you beaming all day long. The hot water not only works fast, but lasts a whole shower? FANTASTIC!

It can be sickening and downright boring to everyone else, but to you? Yes, the fact that you have a sunny living room is, like, the highlight of your morning. Because it is YOUR living room.

Um.

My point here…

Oh – right.

So I’m in the living room, bathrobe adorned, coffee sipping, sun marveling, and there’s a knock at the door.

What the hell. It’s 8 in the freakin’ morning on a Saturday and there’s someone at our door already?

I tip toe to the door (because we have creaky floors) (and yes, for the record, we love those too), and I peak through the peephole.

Why, there’s a man who looks an awful lot like a cop standing on our porch.

Seriously?

We’ve been in the house all of 7 days and we’re already being visited by the police?

Just fabulous.

Being the good law-abiding residents that we are, I open the door figuring there must be some random explanation for our uniformed visitor, and it couldn’t possibly involve us breaking the law.

Cop guy: “Is that your car parked out there ma’am?”

(I quickly make note that he’s pointing at Trevor’s car that is parked at the curb directly in front of our house)

Me: “Yes.”

Cop guy: “Would you mind moving it please? Your neighbor next door has called and complained that she cannot get her car out of the driveway.”

(At this point I’ve sized up that the car is a bit close to the driveway)

Cop guy continues: “She wanted us to come and tow the vehicle…”

(Tow? TOW? Why the hell didn’t she just come and ask us to move it forward 12 inches?)

Cop guy: “…however, if it’s yours and you’re able to move it…”

(um, YEA)

Cop guy: “…I’d rather we just do that.”

(I’d rather we just do that too)

Me: “Uh, yea, bit of a no-brainer there. I’ll get dressed and take care of it.”

At this point I’d like to provide a little bit of background information…

- We were warned by the previous owner’s brother (the surviving heir) that the neighbor next door is a bit “crazy”. Given that the previous owner’s brother was a bit on the “loo-loo” side himself, we just assumed she was “old-lady crazy” and figured we wouldn’t hear much from her.

- Of all the driveways on the block, hers is the only one with painted red on either side.

- For the record: Trevor’s car was technically in the red, but not blocking the driveway.

Now I’d like to provide a little bit of background information on the neighbors garage/driveway situation:

- Her house makes our house look good (we bought a “fixer-upper”)

- Her garage should be leveled as it is clearly a deathtrap for any rats that live in it.

- At this point in the game, we were not entirely sure of her even owning a car, let alone housing it in the deathtrap-for-rats garage of hers. I.e. she had not driven a car in the time we had been there, and therefore, well, what the hell was all the URGENCY about?

- Her driveway is no more than a dirt pad with tire marks. At the foot is a small 3 foot high fence that runs the length of the foot of her drive and then stops at our property line. The fence is locked at all times by a chain and padlock. Additionally, she stakes two pieces of rebar into the ground against the fence and wedges them in place by large rocks.

We assume this is her idea of a “secure gated driveway”.

Note: the fence ends at our property line where there is NO fence to continue on from there. So, if any intruder is thwarted by the chain/padlock/rebar/rock security system, and they don’t think to merely step OVER the fence, then they can just walk around the fence on our property line and get onto her property that way.

To do what exactly, I don’t know.

I suppose what I’m getting at here is that her security system is probably only effective on midget burglars with poor troubleshooting skills.

So.

Trevor’s car was encroaching on her driveway and I headed out to move it. At which point I discovered a parking ticket on the windshield.

To sum up:

- the night before Trevor parked the car and didn’t pull far enough forward.

- at 7pm the Crazy Old Lady (from this point forward will be referred to as the COL) called the police and they came and ticketed the car for inappropriate parking.

- at 8am the following morning she called the police, apparently appalled that the car hadn’t budged in 12 hours, and asked them to come tow the car.

Not once did she come by and ask us to move the car.

Given this was our first interaction with the COL, we gave her the benefit of the doubt. She’s old, lives alone, probably isolated. I figured she felt intimidated about coming and introducing herself, and maybe she didn’t even realize it was our car. We’re new to the neighborhood, she probably hadn’t noticed what kind of cars we drive at this point.

Oh how empathetic and benefit-of-the-doubting I can be sometimes.

Being Good Neighbors

2007-02-06T16:08:00.000-08:00

Upon buying a new house and moving into a new neighborhood everyone has different ideas about how they will get along with their neighbors. Some may only hope to be on a first name basis after awhile, making a brief acknowledgment in passing from front door to car. Others may hope to aspire to a greater level of friendliness, sharing recipes over the fence, trusting each other with house sitting responsibilities, and maybe sharing a drink from time to time.

I can tell you however, that there are not likely many people who hope that they will have a neighbor who calls the police on them 4 times in 3 weeks.

No. Not likely.

But Trevor and I have been blessed with such a neighbor.

Do not despair however – we find only humor in our “eclectic” crazy old lady neighbor.

Since we find such great humor in her antics, it became abundantly clear to me that I should begin what I will call the Crazy Lady Chronicles.

To date I have four solid stories to share, as well as miscellaneous anecdotes to pepper here and there. Amidst my trying to blog regularly on Bloggity Woggity and Never Ending Projects, I will try to throw in a CLC entry.

And like all things certain in life, I’m sure the CL next door will provide me with many more little ditty’s to share with my blog audience. I anticipate she will be great fodder.

That being said…I will post my first entry of the Crazy Lady Chronicles shortly.

Time for the finger

2007-02-01T17:23:00.000-08:00

Time is a fickle friend of mine lately.
It seems that ever since we bought our house, I have no time to get to all the things that need getting to. But when I'm at the office, time sloooooooooooooooowwwwwssssssss down.
No offense to my job - but it's just not where I want to be right now.
How frustrating is that?
But that's not really my point of blogging this afternoon.
My point of blogging at this very moment is because a random stranger pissed me off at lunch.

So, let me drag my soapbox over here and take a moment to set the record straight.

Attention you stupid bitch with the bad attitude:

Should I choose to park in a spot at Whole Foods, that is my right. If there are no signs posted to the contrary, that means I may park there for as long as I please. If what pleases me is to take whatever time necessary to put my bag in my trunk, get in the car, plug my iPod into my car charger, take off my coat, and THEN back out of my parking spot - that is my right.
Let me review YOUR rights...
You reserve the right to vulture. I do not necessarily condone this behavior, or practice it in general unless absolutely necessary, but I will admit that you have technical right to block half the lane with your fancy car and wait for someone to move so you may park. You reserve the right to wait as long as you feel is necessary. You reserve the right to stay put rather than drive and find a spot, perhaps 10 yards away, because my spot is closer. You have that right yes.
Let me review what is NOT your right...
Upon my vacating what was previously MY spot, YOU do NOT have the right to HONK at me and then as I look in my rearview to see why I'm being honked at, GIVE ME THE FINGER.
No.
This is not your right.
I will not apologise for taking a mere 20 seconds to dock my iPod and take off my coat. I will not apologise for making you wait a couple more seconds for a parking spot that is no more yours than mine. I will not apologise for the precious 20 seconds you feel robbed of - 20 seconds you will be later to your nail appointment, 20 seconds that are just NOT significant in the grand scheme of things.
20 seconds that (coming from someone who would love a little more time in her day as my intro to this blog will support) will not KILL you to loose.
I do admit that the one thing I am sorry for is not stopping my car and asking you what the hell your problem is.
Because clearly you have some judgement skills issues that need refining. Either that or you have Tourette's of the hand.

The MAHB is over!

2007-01-22T17:17:00.000-08:00

Ok, so let's just pretend that there hasn't been a huge lapse of time where I have been nothing but silent.
We all know that I have neglected my blog...and I could go on for the next 5 minutes coming up with excuses, ingratiating myself to my fans (i.e. one fan - hi Mom! Did you get my email yesterday by the way?).
But if I had the time to do that, I would have been blogging this whole time - instead of pretending that I was going to get around to it any day now.
Any. Day. Now.
Yep yep...just need to find a little time.
Any daaaaay...sssss...er...months...now.
We could refer to that space in time as the time that Mary Avoided Her Blog. Or the MAHB.
Pronounce: Maw-b.
Like "the mob that has been stalking Mary, trying to get her to blog more".
Moving right along.
So I get round to logging into Blogger to get a little blog going, only to find that there is some new and fancily improved upon version of Blogger. Thank you Google.
Google is slowly taking over the world.
Naturally, being the early adopter that I try to be, I initiated the conversion of my account from the old, archaic caveman's version of blogger, to the new! and improved! and super-duper crazy fun and exciting Blogger!
Only to find things are pretty much the same.
And I get this email...congratulating me on my switch over, and OH BOY now I can start using the new Blogger right away!
Google, if you're going to take over the world, you're going to have to be a little more exciting than just changing the font on some of the buttons.
But who am I to judge. You were probably hoping I wouldn't notice because I haven't blogged since, like, June, or something.
Oh you misjudged dear Google. I may not remember to bring my laptop into the office, and quite frequently I've tried to go to work in my slippers (not intentionally I should point out), but I DO remember totally insignificant things like what Blogger used to look like.
Perhaps I am too quick to make assumptions here.
I will attempt to blog again. Soon. With more rapid a succession than once every 6 months.
And perhaps I will be wowed by some "feature" or "tool" that I haven't quite stumbled across just yet.
We shall see.
Oh yes.
We SHALL see.
(not sure which I'm doubting more at this point: the idea that I may find a cool new feature hidden within Blogger...or whether or not I will actually blog anytime soon)

Still kicking...

2006-06-26T23:29:00.000-07:00

Day 9 of my life sans The Husband and I have only one thing to say to his new employers:

"SEND HIM HOME NOW"

Sigh.

You know, I'm a fairly independent woman, but this is getting ridiculous. 9 days? with 4 more to go?

Hello?!?

I want my husband home.

Now.

At least he's doing well - enjoying his new job, causing havoc wherever he turns, shaking up the system, being wild! and crazy!

Saturday I finally got to hear his voice, which, as it turns out, when you haven't talked to your spouse in about 6 days, can make you downright giddy. Like we just started dating giddy.

It's the little things no?

He made it to Atlanta - phase 2 of his training regimen. Apparently things are going well with work, and he's feeling productive and inspired. But he's ready to come home.

And, um, yea...I want him home now too.

Sure does free up a girl in the evenings to do stuff though.

Like Blog.

And drink wine.

And stress about all the things scheduled to be accomplished over the summer.

Or drunkenly stress about all the schlings sledgluled to accompliss over the slummmmmer.

Shoot me now.

But don't you worry about me.

I'm not really drunk. See? Totally coherent.

Look at that! Using words like "coherent".

Oh, and I have my cats too. So, no worries!

Did I mention one of my cats is a vomiter?

Yea.

And I have wine. Did I mention the wine?

Yea, so even though my Husband is gone, I have my vomiting cats and boxed wine.

Oh, I know you're tempted to feel sorry for me right about now.

But oh no! You should be envious. Really. Be envious.

I think right about now is a good time to go take my wine, a book, and a cat (or two) to the couch and wind down for the evening.

Alone.

Sans my husband.

Hmpf.

Send wine. And maybe some boxes.

2006-06-23T15:04:00.000-07:00

As much as I’m sure all of you have been enjoying my silence…

Who am I kidding…are any of you even checking my blog with any regularity anymore?

Hello?

Anyone?

So you all will have to excuse the unintentional void that has been my blog for, what, like months and month and more months?

Last you checked in here, I got a new job.

That “new job” is no longer something I would consider “new”. It has quickly become the old crotchety pain in the ass job that we all love because it pays our bills, but makes us yearn for our weekends with even more vigor.

I have been pushed, pulled, wrung out, hung out, and left to pick up the pieces. I’m sure I saw new wrinkles on my face last week, every day I’m sure I’ll find my first grey hair (none yet thank you God!), can’t stay awake past 11pm, and have (for the first time) officially said “I need a glass of wine” upon coming home before kissing my husband hello.

And have subsequently done that at least 5 more times in the past 2 weeks.

We go through a lot of wine now.

Good thing they sell the good stuff in boxes now.

But!

That’s all part of being the new kid on the block.

You start a new job and you have a rookie card.

After a while you get to know your way around the office and your rookie card slowly starts to make fewer appearances.

Then you are held completely accountable for anything and everything. Rookie no more.

Then the person you are replacing LEAVES.

Then the shit hits the fan – 78 things all go wrong at the same time – and you want to take up Cocaine.

But you can’t because you’re vain and like that little piece of flesh that divides your nostrils into two distinct holes.

And these 78 things? Not your fault. Not in the least.

It’s just the universe.

Playing a funny, ha-ha, trick on you.

78 totally unusual, unlikely, blue-moon, perfectly aligned stars, kind of things happen.

All within 2 weeks of each other.

And all of this is going down at work while some particularly crazy things are happening in your private life.

This is the real reason I’m blogging today.

To make a few announcements to the blogosphere on behalf of myself and my husband.

(Clearing throat)

Today I would like to make a few statements, and then provide a few answers.

If I do not answer a question here – it is entirely likely we don’t have one as of yet.

Sometimes in life, we just don’t know.

And no, I’m not pregnant. So all you family members out there can stop getting excited.

Here are the developments (roughly in order):

- we decided to sell the house

- The husband lost his job

- The husband graduated

- The husband started a new job

- The husband is currently in France (bastard)

Here are some answers regarding the house:

- yes, we are selling it to our partner

- the transaction will roughly take place early July – we will be moving out by end of July

- yes, we will be moving apartments, most likely up the Peninsula

- no, we don’t know if we’re buying another house

- no, we don’t know where we’re going to live

- yes, we’re considering moving apartments because it is no longer strategically located near our jobs

Here are some answers regarding The Husband loosing his job

- they were evil bastards and we hated their guts

Here are some answers regarding The Husbands new job:

- he’s in France for training (bastard)

- no, we are not moving to France (so very sad)

- his new office is in San Francisco in a very high building with a view of Pac Bell park from his desk (did I mention he’s a bastard?)

Ok, that’s it! Band Aid is off!

As you can see, we’ve been, um, busy. And it’s far from over. As I see it, we’ll be moving twice in the next 2 or 3 months.

We are certainly embarking on the next chapter in our lives.

Actually, I think we’ve really crammed 4 or 5 chapters into just 3 months. But, you know, I don’t mind change, and it’s nice to get it all over with right?

Groan.

I need a vacation.

But we can’t take one because we both started new jobs and have no vacation time saved up! And any time we DO take off is going to be used for MOVING.

Sigh.

If anyone needs me I’ll be at Target stocking up on boxed wine.

New job? Wha?

2006-04-10T17:00:00.000-07:00

So Thursday came like any other day.

Only I was laid off.

But, you know, whatever.

It didn't really bother me, so I went to the gym like I do on any other day around noon time. And then I headed home, ate lunch, loaded my resume on a few job sites, sent my resume to a few job listings.

By 5pm the phone rang, by 5:30 I had an interview for noon on Friday.

So Friday came like any other day.

Only I didn't have a job to go to. I had an old cube to pack up and an interview to get to at noon.

By noon I was at my interview, by 2pm I was on my way out the door confident I nailed the job. I went to the gym, worked off some adrenaline, and by 5pm I accepted a verbal job offer over the phone.

Yes, that WAS fast.

I still have no idea how it happened really.

But all I know is that tomorrow FedEx will bring me a big fat juicy job package to look over and sign, and Monday I have a cush new job with totally amazing, young, hip, and fun people. I will work in a building where I have to take an elevator, where there are views of the SF bay out of the office windows, where I will officially have "moved up". A job where people hired me for my "expertise" and "experience", people who have no idea how to accomplish what they want without someone like me. People, apparently I am a subject matter expert on something. Apparently I am an "asset".

It's amazing how much you can learn about yourself in just 24 hours.

All because I was laid off on Thursday.

I'll miss my old job, my hypothetical one that is. But shit, I was so ready for this.

Prêt-à-Porter, except not

2006-03-30T10:42:00.000-08:00

I've procrastinated long enough. It is high time I made a decision about what the hell I'm going to wear to this wedding on Saturday.

Why fret do you ask? Why on earth is this such a difficult decision?

(first I use "ditty" recently and now "fret"? What is WRONG with me?)

Well, for one the problem is that it's me making this decision. I like to make clothing and accessory decisions more difficult than they really should be. But mostly the problem is because there are a few unconventional things to consider:

- the ceremony will be followed by a "Casual BBQ party"
- it is requested that attendees wear "comfy picnic clothes"
- it will be an OUTDOOR event, rain will not cancel
- and even though this bears no significance on what I will wear, I felt it necessary to point out that it is noted in the evite that this will be an "alcohol free family event" so that I can gleam the appropriate amount of sympathy for going to an event where there will be lots of screaming kids and NO ALCOHOL

So, in short, what I am presented with here is: A MAJOR DILEMMA

What the hell do I wear?

I feel very odd about wearing jeans to a wedding. But I almost feel as though I have no choice considering it will be outside and WET. Even if it doesn't rain ON the day in question, it has been raining for like the past 212 days which means everything will be damp.

And what if it does rain? I don't exactly feel excited about hanging around outside wearing a cute spring-y top. So what? Do I go clad in jeans, and a fuzzy sweater? Sport some boots and a rain coat? Hell, why don't I grab myself one of those ponchos they wear to outdoor sporting events when it rains. Maybe I'll paint my face while I'm at it and throw on a big foam finger.

"Hey Bride lady...what are your colors? Yea...I'm painting my face for the wedding and I thought it would be cute if I matched your theme."

(Does one even have colors when they throw a BBQ reception?)

Who the hell plans for an OUTDOOR wedding in early April anyway? Huh? HUH? Ever hear the phrase "April showers brings May flowers"? Yea, funny thing about that saying. They said it because there is usually a good chance we get RAIN in APRIL.

Stupid. This is so frick-frick-FRICKEN stupid.

And NO alcohol.

So even if I end up dressed totally inappropriately, there will be no alcohol to both sooth my annoyance and warm me from within.

And the kids? Oh my god, there will be swarms of them. And half of which have all kinds of developmental disorders...

And no alcohol.

Did I mention that part?

It's a superb product actually

2006-03-23T15:11:00.000-08:00

Ok, so apparently Junket is not a commonly known desert item.

I've gotten a couple "what the fuck is Junket?" comments since my last post.

Well, it's yumminess basically. It's a tasty little treat that my grandmother used to make every day as a snack for my sister and I.

Back when technically having a "desert" for an afternoon snack was considered not only acceptable but downright typical. Gotta miss those days. Having desert for a snack nowadays may be typical for most American kids, however it is looked upon shamefully and with disgust considering the Nation's issue with childhood obesity.

You know what? To that I say make them run their little asses around for a while occasionally - you're not going to stay a healthy weight sitting on your duff playing Grand Theft Auto 27 all day long.

And there I go with the digressing already.

So! Junket!

Observe how overtly dedicated the manufacturer has stayed to maintaining their level of marketing trendiness:

And their website only backs me up on this even more.

Yes, people. We apparently still reside in the 70's.

So yes, Junket does still in fact exist - much to my pleasure.

I shall have to locate it and make some. It appears I may have to actually order it online as I have not noticed it gracing many grocery store shelves in my area.

And to answer the question "what the fuck is Junket?", according to the website it's a:

"Superb product that can be used to prepare various delightful desserts for the whole family to enjoy!"

Wee fun! It makes me want to go right out and have a superbly delightful experience with my whole family!

But more specifically it's these little tablets that looks like pills - and when you add them to scalded milk they dissolve and by means that can only be explained by using words such as "magic!" and "miraculously!" the milk solidifies into a sweet custard-y likeness. The kind that reminds me of He-Man and She-Ra, Smurfs, and all the other fabulous 80's shows that came on between the hours of 3pm and 5pm, Monday through Friday.

And there we have it.

Layered gelatinous substance known as...

2006-03-22T16:22:00.000-08:00

Jello 123?

Anyone?

Ring any bells?

Jello 123 is one of those things that I am aware existed. The name itself does not register ignorance or stupification on my part.

(I mean, a lot of things do, so when something does not render me stupified I consider it cause for cheering and lots of celebration)

However, this past weekend it was made clear to me that while I am familiar with this little diddy from the past - I had NO IDEA what the hell it was or, most importantly, DID.

(Did I just say "diddy"?)

People - it is a magically layered gelatinous desert that is made just like jello. Only it's layered? Layers people! It's fancy, and different, and I apparently had no idea that such a fanciness ever existed.

Not until I was digging through our pantry and discovered 2 faded pink little boxes that had obviously been designed by marketers living in the 80's.

My Husband, you see...he had these from who knows how long ago. And they have just sat in our pantry all this time, untouched, unblended, unLAYERED.

Naturally I was curious. I was dubious, in fact, that I was somehow familiar with this product, but had no clue what the product was or did.

(This is, as it turns out, how I recall most of the 80's. Vague recollection, many familiarities, but limited memories or actual knowledge of what things existed or how they worked)

So I got out the blender.

And I followed the directions very carefully - not wanting to mess with the magic.

And as I poured the frothy jello like fluid into cups...there was layering.

Yes.

They were layering all on their own.

There was no intervention on my part required. They merely layered into 3 separate layers, one red, one pink, and one white.

I'm thinking that's where the "123" comes into play. I could be wrong, but I have a strong suspicion.

Poof! Magic!

(like how I'm now inserting my thoughts amongst my blogging?)

And then my husband goes and Google's "jello 123" and discovers that Jello is no longer manufacturing the delightful little product due to "limited interest" on the consumer's part.

To that I say "balk!" and "Scoff!" and "WHATEVER!".

Are the "consumer's" aware of the magical layering? Because it seems obvious to me that perhaps if Jello were more clear about this in their marketing of the product then perhaps the "limited interest" would become "well received by the public" and then I would be able to buy this stuff whenever I wanted to.

(I mean, it's not like I'm not already just thinking out loud...like, what else is blogging if it's not thinking out loud?)

But now I can probably only acquire this stuff off of ebay. Which I'm not inclined to do considering how skeptical I was at using our own box given how old it was. Why would I want to buy someone else's ancient Jello product that has god only knows what kind of insects nesting in it?

(and now I'm just distracting you from some pretty scintillating contemplation on my part)

So I'll just make up the last box with a heavy heart, knowing that it will be the last Jello 123 I will ever consume. Perhaps even document the experience.

Maybe I'll start reviving old deserts from the 70's and 80's.

Next week we will be discussing Junket.

Wait. Does anyone know if you can still buy Junket?

For those of you who are interested...

2006-01-24T12:28:00.000-08:00

Even though I'm failing miserably at this whole consistent blogging thing...I'm going to be blogging on our projects blog quite regularly (ha!) since we seem to be up to our ta-ta's in projects. And I like to keep a journal on these kinds of things.

For those of you who are interested you can find us here.

And who knows, maybe I'll actually be consistent.

What's in a name?

2005-12-21T12:25:00.000-08:00

Finally! Somthing other than "Mother of God"

Mary

Bitter : Hebrew
You are charming, talented and have a very positive attitude to life so it is hardly surprising that you attract success and recognition. Focussed and patient you understand that material rewards are a result of discipline. Being so creative and with a need for self-expression you may be drawn towards the arts, travel is also likely to be important. A loyal friend, you are a person who must be allowed freedom and independence.

...and stuff

2005-12-20T10:30:00.000-08:00

Well, this is just a whole new low for me.

Over a month.

Over a month has passed and I have not even logged into Blogger ONCE to start a blog. There's a good chance that the thought hadn't even crossed my mind to log on either. Sure, that's a pretty good bet.

Hello? You should probably pick yourselves off the floor by now. I mean, those of you (who are few in quantity by now I'm sure) who actually waste the 5 seconds it takes to cruise by my blog to see if I've even blogged anything of late. Which, the odds usually aren't favoring.

But look at me! Here I am! I found some time and now I'm blogging. And I will be making no promises. Because apparently that only jinxes me and then I don't write for chunks of time.

In fact, I BAWK at blogging.

Blogging-schmogging.

I shall never make an attempt to blog again.

(we'll see if this will arouse some rebellion in me)

Good lord what a ka-raaaaazy month this has been. I suppose this is typical for the holidays. But peeps? Seriously. This is by far the most insane holiday season for me yet and most of the things that have kept me busy are SO NOT the most holiday-ee-esque.

Stomach virus? Sure, definite correlation between illnesses and the holidays. However, I assure you I wasn't exactly humming Christmas carols to myself while voiding the contents of my stomach at 3 in the morning.

Then our trip out to Denver was fun, but short lived, and mostly split between recuperation from the previous week spent vomiting and cheering husband on as he begrudgingly studied for HOURS. Who's idea was it to schedule midterms right after Turkey day?

And ok, ok - Thanksgiving is officially clumped in as "The Holidays". So there was ONE thing lately that I par-took in that was holiday related.

But if you ask Halmark "the Holidays" begins way back with Memorial Day. Seriously. Halloween decorations at the 4th of July?

A Fast trip to Miami was loads of fun. Yes. Trip #2. That makes two airplane related travel thingies within 2 weeks. And I'm sure you'll all agree that traveling, especially at great distances, saps an additional 2 days from your schedule to allow for laundry, packing, un-packing, re-packing, and shopping in preparation for packing. And that's just before your trip.

Oh, and hey! I may even blog about our trip! Wouldn't that be neato.

And oh god, then there's work. Work, which by the very name implies, is worky-like.

Blah.

I've come to love my job. I love how it's morphed into something that keeps me thinking. On the stairclimber, in the shower, in the car. I'm constantly thinking about things I want to do, projects I want to start, presentations, trainings, meetings, ack ack ack.

But my job? Even busier lately.

There was, like, a week there where I seriously thought I was going to forget to put shoes on before leaving in the morning. The BestFriend will attest to the very sad state I was in from all the stress and Kuh-rah-zy-ness that was going on. That's right. Kuh-rah-zy-ness.

And oh yea - Husband had his finals. My follow up question to the midterms post-turkey day question would be: and then why do you go and schedule finals just 3 weeks after midterms?

But no shoes were forgotten! We made it through. And now I find myself, one week from Christmas, and a crap load of shopping to accomplish.

But that is ok. Normally I would be groaning all the way to the mall two days before the big day.

You see, I used to be this person who was constantly trying to rekindle that christmassy feeling she got every year when she was a kid. Somewhere between 17 and 19 that feeling just dissipated. Phase? Byproduct of life in general? Who knows. It was just gone.

Don't get me wrong. I still totally loved the holidays. I would go to parties, enjoy the lights, douse my car with sap and bring a tree home. But that added feeling was always gone. That warm fuzzy one. The one that makes you want to just sit by your tree, with all the lights out, and sip a cider.

That's it.

Just sit there and smile to yourself. Feeling all the goodness and happiness that just being in the middle of the Christmas season gives you.

A feeling that had just disappeared.

And this year it returned on Saturday.

Nearly 10 years has passed. And I couldn't tell you why. But the leading contender of suspicions is that I just stopped fighting for it. I just stopped looking for it and wishing it was there when it wasn't.

That and I baked recently. That always makes a difference.

The whole weekend the Husband and I shopped, and relaxed, wrapped presents, and were just generally content. And it rained and stormed outside, and we had our fire and our tree and I relished every moment of it.

The Christmas fuzziness is back and I couldn't be happier to have it.

So I sit here, tip-tapping away at my keyboard with my Christmas music playing.

Can't wait for the weekend.

Can't wait for our New Year's stint out to Washington DC.

Yes, trip #3 in a 45 day period.

Holy Smoking Washing Machines Batman!

2005-11-11T11:51:00.000-08:00

Ok - so I'm SORT of habitual about this whole blogging thing.

This is like the third time this week! Yea me!

So I thought I might make good on tying up a few loose ends in the Blog universe. Today I will be concluding the story that I mentioned I may or may not get around to in regards to laundry. I bet you are all on the edge of your seats now, reading faster, heart rates sky-rocketing.

Because Laundry is SO hot. So scintillating. SO fabulomatastisk!

Ok, fine. See here.

If you work your way down, past the half way mark, after a bunch of rambling, blabbing, and general pro-brevity sentiment, you will find a remark I made about our washing machine.

To be exact:

"Except when the washer emits smoke and threatens to explode. But that's another story which I may or may not get around to telling ..."

So there, considering this ME finally getting around to telling the story of our incredible smoking washing machine.

It was just an average Friday night. The husband and I had hauled ourselves up to Sacramento for the weekend. Lately I have taken to starting laundry on Friday nights because I am a LOOSER and like to get it out of the way so that we have more time for projects throughout the weekend with limited interruption.

Since generally it's a bad idea to rotate clean laundry when you're up to your eyeballs in sweat and sawdust.

I was about one laundry rotation and 1.5 glasses of wine into the evening when I finally joined The Husband for a movie.

Apparently I am now tracking my time in quantities of alcohol consumed.

Figures.

About 15 minutes into the movie I started to smell something foul and generally un-good.

Burning rubber is never something you want to smell IN the house.

Upon turning to The Husband I see that he has registered the same concern and we simultaneously look up at the video projector from whence the movie cometh forth.

And we both become buggedy-eyed and concerned that our new precious BABY was melting down.

Fortunately it was not in fact the projector. Which left us with only a moment of relief before it was replaced with the OH MY GOD WHAT THE HELL IS THAT SMELL fear.

Was the house burning down??

And then it occurred to us both that it WAS possible that during the installation of the projector - and all the wiring that was required - that the attic was now on fire from some faulty wiring.

Holy shit that was a freaky moment. The very idea that the insulation in our attic was engulfed in flames left me feeling simultaneously very helpless and VERY aware of the consequences. That and was my husband capable of bad wiring that would cause the house to fall down in a smoldering heap? I mean, the guy knows what he's doing! How could this happen??

We grabbed a ladder and ran to the laundry room where the attic access is. The room was filled with smoke and smelled even worse than the bedroom.

At least we were getting closer - but this did not bode well for the attic/fire/crap/we're in deep shit now theory.

My Husband climbed up the ladder and very carefully pushed the access open.

We've seen Backdraft people! Excellent movie - lots of hot firemen running around, I highly recommend it. But I was having NONE of that in MY house thankyouverymuch. Well, all the scary fire and backdrafts at least.

And THANK GOD there was nothing but fresh air up there.

And apparently we had located our burning-stinky-smell source.

The laundry room - and in it, the currently running and highly suspect washing machine.

We turned it off, kicked on the vent, and let the room clear for a few minutes. The Husband checked the wiring and hoses, and after confirming they were ok, he turned it on again.

And the bad, evil, stinky smell returned.

Thankfully it doesn't take a person of high intellect to deduce a conclusion from this scenario. Which was in our favor given our combined wine consumption for the evening. Apparently the spin cycle was having issues and Mr. Maytag man will have to pay us a visit.

And with that we went to bed.

And the next morning I lugged a load of soaking wet laundry to the local Laundromat and sulked that one of my favorite appliances was kaput.

Mr. Maytag man came and replaced a bearing and a belt and chastised us for apparently over-loading the machine.

Um, excuse me? Over-load an EXTRA LARGE washing machine? I don't think I've EVER had what would be even considered a FULL load let alone an EXTRA LARGE. I haven't even washed a comforter or a sleeping bag which this beast is promoted to enjoy and reply "thank you may I have another".

Hello? This man was accusing me of ABUSING my washing machine? Any of you neat freak cleaning fanatics will know my pain.

Whatever.

So all is better now - I am happy to report that our washing machine is back to it's normal routine. And I no longer have to drudge off to the Laundromat and suffer from all the horrible inconveniences that I illustrated from my Thursday Blues post.

Cuz it's just agony I'm telling you.

In an attempt to make a habit of this...

2005-11-07T10:23:00.000-08:00

Look at me! I'm blogging again!

With nothing particular to blog about. I mean, sure I've got stuff to blog about. Technically. My head is always swarming with ideas.

But I've got an itty bitty amount of time. Which is NO time to try and write anything of real content.

I'm drawing a complete blank of what I preoccupied my time with this weekend. I recall it being busy, involving a few too many beers (translation: calories), and changing a toilet seat.

Oh yea. That's was charming.

So our toilet seat cracked Friday night. Go figure. Just cracks and proceeded to pinch the ass of everyone who used it.

Let me tell you - good times.

So I drag the Husband on a study break to the local Home Depot Saturday afternoon and we proceeded to analyze and assess each and every toilet seat option.

This is an important decision you know.

Do you want the more expensive wood variety? The very same that CRACKED for no apparent reason.

But the cheaper plastic variety looks...well...cheap.

Do we just get the same one we had before? But again, it CRACKED. So, not too inclined to go that route.

And then there are the squishy ones filled with air that are comfy and all...but they explode.

I'll let Michele tell THAT particular gem of a story.

And then my husband homed in on the toilet seat of ALL toilet seats. It's like he, being a man, is naturally equipped with some sort of homing device. One that is designed to find the most COOLEST toilet seat out of all the choices.

The SoftClose 2000.

It is a toilet seat that, with a gentle nudge, will close SLOWLY ON IT'S OWN.

No more slamming lids by accident!

And for those of us lazy people who like to disguise our laziness with an apparent need for ultimate efficiency - it's great because it reduces the time spent closing a toilet lid from 1.3 seconds to a mere 0.7 seconds!

That's a savings of 0.6 seconds!

Seriously - that's a big deal!

If you think about it, if you use the restroom approximately 3 times a day, that's 1.8 seconds you're saving a day. 12.6 seconds a week...655.2 seconds a year, which is like, 11 minutes!

Over your entire life time you could save 15 hours closing the toilet!

And that's just if you go 3 times a day - some people go twice that! 30 hours people! Something to seriously consider here.

So this is how I spend my Saturday evenings - installing toilet seats. But, you know, it was like 4 beers into the evening and I thought it was a great plan.

And I only dropped 2 of the bolts into the toilet bowl. But I wasn't so knackered that I didn't put on some gloves FIRST before reaching in and pulling them out. So that's good.

You know you have a drinking problem if you reach into toilets bare-handed.

And the seat was only slightly crooked and was easily fixed the next morning after all the beer had vacated my system.

This is what Do-it-Yourselfer's do on their Saturday nights.

Get drunk and fix toilets.

Next week I'll amuse all of you by getting drunk and hanging sheet rock.

Who'd have thunk.

2005-11-04T14:13:00.000-08:00

Look Tiff! I'm blogging - two days in a row! The lunacy!

Today's topic of choice is Real Estate.

Oh yes - I'm now going to talk about Real Estate.

Never mind the light hearted anecdotes I have so lovingly compiled in the past. Oh no. Now I'm going to talk about the exciting wide-world of housing!

Apparently my work (that doesn't necessarily exist) has distilled all humorous story-telling out of me. Damn you non-existent slave drivers!

Ok, so, you can't live in the Bay Area and not be aware of the fact that there is a bubble that is going to BURST.

Any day.

Yep. Any day now.

Yesiree.

The news is all over it at all times. Not a day goes by that I haven't noticed a headline that either uses the word "bubble" or "housing market" or "interest rates". In fact, I could probably pop on to Yahoo News right now and dig up some recent article on the state of the real estate market...

What the HELL? Coca Cola will be discontinuing their Vanilla Coke line?

WHAT?!

WHY WOULD THEY DO THAT?

...and that is SO not what I meant to blog about.

Ok, so - the real estate market.

So you've got your news, and then you've got your friends. So I have one friend who is this real estate buff and has been playing with it as a hobby for probably over 10 years now. She has some investment property, loves to watch the Bay Area market, and is more recently interested in trading in her cute little 3 bedroom tiny bungalow in Willow Glen for something a bit more roomy. All the while she gives me all kinds of advise and commentary on the market. And then there's another friend - the lovely Tiff - who blogs on occasion about her Real Estate woes and tribulations.

And then you've got me and my Husband.

You know - the ones with the weird living situation. I'd recap but I'm lazy - so just go read this entry if you really care. Brevity is not my strong point, but I ASSURE you there is an explanation SOMEWHERE in that particular blog entry.

I think.

Often times I wonder what will the next chapter for us be like in the whole living situation realm. As much as I LOVE the confusing lifestyle. And WEE FUN I love maintaining more than one household. I'm thinking a consolidation is definitely in order. And soon.

And my poor husband. I'm a woman - what can I say? I like to dream...think about the possibilities. Talk about them OUT LOUD. I think I drive him nuts.

So my latest dream is that we might actually stay in the Bay Area. Which in it's own way is INSANE. I mean, a little research and I quickly learned that we would not be able to find a free standing house for less than $500,000. And you know, as much as the whole idea of living in a place that looks just like an apartment is great and all, except if you OWN it. Hello? Owning an apartment? Owning a cookie-cutter mini-house where you share the walls with strangers and to add insult you are expected to pay HOA fees so they can paint YOUR HOUSE whatever color they want? "They" being the mini-government that you have just now volunteered to live under because lord knows that having a Federal and State Government isn't enough - no, gosh darn it, you need a Community Government to harass you too.

And they call these fancy things "Condos" or "Townhouses". My ass.

Ha.

They all just look like apartments.

But I'm a realistic woman. I know that if our jobs keep us here in the Bay Area (which they are looking more and more like they will) (if I had a job that is) (and if I did I wouldn't blog about it here) (you think I'm crazy?) we will have to find SOME place that we can call home. And throwing our money away to the rental-pit of despair is SO not an option in my book. Furthermore I refuse to allow either one of us to commute more than 45 minutes each - and even that is undesirable. We've done the weekend commute long enough - I'm tired, it gets old (after, like, day 2), and it's just not realistic.

So we'll find ourselves a nice little 3 bedroom (grumble) "townhouse" with a one car garage and call it home. Because it will be ours - and we'll be happy we have anything at all.

So you might imagine my surprise when I stumbled across quite the little gem of information.

There is LAND available. Yes! LAND!

Dirt - with nothing on it!

HERE - in the Bay Area!

And no - not, like, in Gilroy (and yes, there are some that consider that the "Bay Area").

In Redwood City no less! Emerald Hills! In the East San Jose Hills!

It's an ANOMALY!

I haven't figured it out yet. But I have my suspicions. See below for those. Oh yes, I'll get into those. This blog is not NEARLY long enough yet to be one of mine.

I mean - 1/4 of an acre in the Emerald Hills for $300k? Kidding right? Sick, cruel, mean, sadistic kind of ha-ha humor?

But it exists!

And there are no seminars involved - no crazy investment scams that I know of.

Just land. Complete with electric to the property line, sewage and water, and an MLS listing number!

MY GOD IT'S INSANE.

Oh MAN - and for those of you who know us you'd know that we are SO ALL OVER building our own house from the ground up. With a little help from a few professionals of course.

Seriously!

We ARE crazy folk you know - we built and hung our bed from the ceiling as some of you may recall.

So apparently there's hope.

It may mean we'll be living out of a free standing garage and an RV on some dirt in the Emerald Hills. But hey! It'll be ours, the commute won't suck, and we will officially be property owners in the Bay Area.

So my suspicions.

I'm thinking that people are just not into the whole *buying a totally empty lot and building everything from the ground up themselves* kind of thing. I mean, it's a TON of work. You've got to get architects in there. If you care about the trees you should probably get an arborist-guy in to poke around. Then there's trenching for electricity, water, sewer, fiber optics down from the street. Getting permits, hiring contractors, getting manicures, pedicures, making your hair appointments.

Part time job at the very least.

And then you basically are waiting for about a year before it's livable.

Maybe we are crazy.

But I can use a hammer! I'm handy!

Totally nuts.

We are totally and completely nutty-nutty.

And you guys all get to watch!

Either that or I'll get bored with this idea in, like, a month and move on to some other hair brained idea.

But you can keep watching!

Fun!

I have more thoughts on Real Estate and all it's glory but I'll save that for another day.

And if you're familiar with my blog you're probably thinking that you'll check back in maybe 2 weeks and then MAYBE I'll have written again.

But, I don't know. I mean - I wrote yesterday, and now today.

My GOD - I may be making a habit here.

Deep Thoughts? What's happened to me?!

2005-11-03T09:56:00.000-08:00

I was recently reading a blog which has put me in a more serious mood for blogging (thanks a hell of a lot Tiff). I finally get around to blogging and I'm SO not feeling funny.

This will me my very first, official, serious blog, officially. This ought to be interesting.

Warning: for those of you looking for witty and smarmy banter - I'd like to think you'd get it here normally. But not today! Today I have my serious cap on!

So. On to the subject of wants, wanting what we can't have, not getting what we want, wanting, wanting wanting.

Of the many things I've learned in my short (albeit eventful) life, one thing that is pertinent to this topic (how convenient) is that when you want something either you need to go for it, or?

...squash it for good and never look back because you will do nothing but tear yourself up and torture yourself with dissatisfaction for as long as you continue to go without that want being met.

Now, I could go on talking figuratively - never really emphasizing any real point I'm getting at. But I hate doing that.

It's just cause for confusion.

So I will attempt to be more specific.

The first thing that comes to my mind when it comes to "wants" is relationships. Afterall, it's where a vast majority of our wants in life stem from. And we've got all kinds of relationships - working ones, family ones, intimate ones, etc. But today, boys and girls, I will be focusing more seriously about relationships with men.

Once upon a time I dated a guy for a good chunk of my adult life. For those in my audience who know the real 3-D mary, they will remember him fondly as the what-the-fuck-was-mary-thinking? guy.

Or, the Artist.

Retrospectively I agree with all the opinions - he was a "unique" boyfriend.

What this has to do with my theme of the day is that I WANTED certain things out of life and he was not going to give those things to me. And that was ultimately the ruin of that relationship. It was slow, and took me forever to figure out. But if I had to put my finger on why we didn't make it and I don't go home to him every night today - it's because (cliche alert)...we wanted different things.

I shall elaborate.

I wanted kids. He didn't.

I wanted a house. He could never ever ever ever in a million years guarantee he would have rent money next month. So to him, it was out of the question, so wanting wasn't an option.

I wanted marriage. He wasn't really sure about that other than maybe it would gain him financial security (regular paycheck = me). But ultimately? Eh. not really. Marriage didn't mean all that much to him.

At the time I was in my young 20's. Every time I wondered if I could really compromise my wants I shrugged it off because I was too young to worry about it. Which was true. I was having fun. The Artist was a sweet guy. Weird yes. Sweet, fun, handy in the kitchen, yes. So I had no real deadlines or goals to meet anytime soon.

But it harped on me. Because I knew one day that I would be older and I would have to make a choice.

Were those wants really important to me? And if I told myself they weren't, was I prepared to never look back? Because you do that and you find yourself in your 40's - wanting kids and unable to conceive, and having just ruined your relationship with the man you sacrificed your wants for because you subconsciously resented him for not wanting the same things as you. And you can't take it anymore so you leave him to find someone else who has the same wants in life.

So why did you stay with him all along? So you could just widdle away 15 years of your life for fun? Wee fun!

It doesn't go away.

5 years I was with someone who wanted different things. 4 years of which I told myself I didn't have to make a decision. And after 4.5 years I woke up and realized that I WANTED these things. I would look back and hate myself for letting them slip away. You live one life, blah blah blah.

And after 5 years I intentionally walked away from a relationship that, while fun and entertaining and secure, was going to kill me because I would compromise things I wanted just so I wouldn't have to break his heart. Because, after all, he had everything HE wanted.

Fair?

No.

I got angry. Angry because I just sat down and took it. Angry because I wasn't honest with myself and just spent 5 years with a guy who I thought was selfish for getting everything HE wanted out of our relationship but gave me nothing I wanted. And jealous because I lived with a guy who had a great relationship and that's what I wanted.

In hindsight I know that I had no reason to be angry at him. Afterall I never told him I wanted those things. I knew he didn't - because, GASP!, he was honest with me - so I didn't contradict him. I feared our relationship would fail because I wanted different things so I kept my mouth shut.

Ironic huh?

Our different wants in life still killed the relationship. It was just more of a long drawn out slow suffocation rather than a quick heart attack.

Every day we are faced with wanting things. A new car. New job. New hair cut. A new body, new wardrobe, new housemate, a new cat (cuz god knows if you have to pick up cat vomit ONE more time...).

But what are the "wants" that, after the day is up, we NEED them?

What are the wants that have always been there, the ones with staying power?

The ones that caused you to put on your best dress and play wedding when you were 6 years old? Or cradle your baby doll to sleep? Or build houses in your living room out of couch cushions, blankets, and pillows?

For me?

Kids, a house, a marriage.

And I know that it's not 100% possible. Life happens and we're met with obstacles. And not everyone has all their core "wants" met.

But when I was faced with giving them up but never really letting them go, or getting out of a relationship that wasn't giving me what I wanted and taking the chance of finding one that would?

I'm young - those were odds I was willing to risk. And I was damned to not even fight for them.

And I feel a bit of a hypocrite because there was a man who actually wanted to give me all the things I want in life waiting right around the corner. So it appears I had it easy. But I still had to make the choice to be honest with myself about my wants, to leave the artist, and break his heart. I still cryed on my Best Friends shoulder, fell off the face of the planet to my family, packed my cats, my things, and told him goodbye.

The rest was just good timing.

Thank you Tiff for inspiring me to write something a little more candid and thoughtful.

Look! No more Birthday Cake!

2005-10-27T12:42:00.000-07:00

So I thought I'd relieve those of you who frequent my blog (ha!) and actually blog something. You know, so you don't have to keep seeing that stupid birthday cake and the fact that apparently, even though I am barely 26 years of age, I act like a 30 year old.

I never liked those stupid quizzes anyway.

Lame.

That and Tiff asked me to blog.

And it just SO happened that I have, like, 17 minutes before a meeting. More meetings. Meetings meetings meetings.

Meetings where I get more things to do, but don't get the time to do them because...any guesses?

MEETINGS!

Yes! Meetings! Lovely meetings where my company attempts to dull my senses my freezing me to death in a conference room. Perhaps they think that by slowing my blood flow I will be like a docile little ladybug that has been partially frozen so that they may ship me to a home improvement store for the suckers that actually think that if you buy a large quantity of ladybugs and set them free in your yard they will stick around and thank you buy eating your aphids.

Like they actually care?

Like once their little bodies return to a normal temperature they don't see all the other neighbor's yards and decide to frolic over there?

And by now I've completely lost site of just exactly how I have anything in common with these little garden predators. Or if I actually had a point.

Whatever. I'm in a docile frame of mind.

It's cold in here.

I would like to point out here that all of the above is mentioned only under the assumption that I MIGHT be employed.

Not saying I am. For sure. Nothing definitive here.

Just speculation about over zealous air conditioning and little red bugs.

WHAT?!

2005-10-14T12:44:00.000-07:00

You Are 30 Years Old

Under 12: You are a kid at heart. You still have an optimistic life view - and you look at the world with awe.

13-19: You are a teenager at heart. You question authority and are still trying to find your place in this world.

20-29: You are a twentysomething at heart. You feel excited about what's to come... love, work, and new experiences.

30-39: You are a thirtysomething at heart. You've had a taste of success and true love, but you want more!

40+: You are a mature adult. You've been through most of the ups and downs of life already. Now you get to sit back and relax.

What Age Do You Act?

Thursday Blues

2005-10-06T11:17:00.000-07:00

You know, normally I actually quite enjoy Thursdays. It's close enough to the weekend so you start feeling the anticipation of not being at work. Cuz really, that's the best part of weekends. That whole no-working part. Which makes more room for the getting in trouble part.

But for some reason today just seems to be slow, and boring, and lacking in the general weekend anticipatory-ing-ness.

And I think I know why.

I have to do laundry tonight.

And it's not just any normal laundry night.

Oh no no no.

I have to do it in, GASP, the COMMUNAL laundry room at my apartment complex.

Sigh.

I know, I know. Feel sorry for me. Feel horribly horribly sorry for me.

In case my lack of further explanation has confused you...

(insert further explanation here)

For those of you who do not know me or of my TOTALLY BIZZARRO lifestyle (Yipee! Strangers are reading my blog!) I will try to briefly explain. Which means I will stress about being brief the whole time I'm writing, but not actually succeed at being brief.

See what I mean?

Like right there. I was saying I was going to be brief, and I added an additional sentence that for all intents and purposes was probably not necessary for the structure of my story. But I added it anyway.

But let me assure you, I was stressing about brevity the whole time.

Ok. So. I work in the Bay Area. My Husband works AND goes to school in the Bay Area. We have an apartment in the Bay Area.

With me so far? Have I patronized you all to boredom yet?

Here's the curve ball: we own a house near Sacramento - 2 hours away from our apartment.

And we hang there on the weekends getting into all kinds of mischief, sometimes (but not lately) chronicled on my Husbands blog.

Yes, we drive there just about every weekend. No, we don't have plans to move there anytime soon. Yes, we're keeping our jobs in the Bay Area. No, we're not renting it out. Yes, we're crazy. No we're not planning on commuting during the week.

We're not THAT KUH-Razy. Good lord - insanity! I've actually been asked that. 2 hours one way? That is LUNACY. We tried the Friday nights and then home on Monday mornings with all the other commuters out there.

Getting up at 5am to make it in to work by 8am, only to sit in traffic, was SOOOOOO not fun. Especially when all you can think about while staring at tail lights is that if you weren't moronic you'd be asleep in bed right now.

HA! That lasted, like, maybe 8 months. And that was once a week! So now we come home Sunday nights when the roads are clear and Love Line is on.

(trying to be brief, trying to be brief)

And this is where all the laundry is done. Because we are fancy and have a laundry room in our house with a nice, clean, and ONLY USED BY US, washer and dryer. Except when the washer emits smoke and threatens to explode. But that's another story which I may or may not get around to telling since I am already on the topic of all things laundry-like.

So now that you are all caught up.

I am spoiled. I went from doing my laundry in community laundry rooms for almost 10 years to becoming a laundering snob overnight.

But come on people! Home laundry rooms are obviously very convenient as you can do loads at all hours and not stress that some perv is stealing your panties.

Um, yea. Not joking.

But there's more to it.

First of all - there's the matter of actually getting a machine. Depending on the size of your apartment complex's laundry room, you may be competing with 20 other people for 2 washers and 2 dryers. Fortunately I no longer live in a small complex.

But the larger the complex, and consequently the larger the laundry room, does not necessarily guarantee a machine when you need it. There's more equipment to break down, get coins stuck in, garbage to find inside.

And my favorite...the people who dump a cup of the granular soap in and then decide NOT to do a wash. For those of you who are thrifty out there you might think YEA! Free detergent!

For those of us who prefer not to risk skin allergies with unknown laundry detergents we think NEXT!

Because itchy hives, yea, pretty much suck.

And the quarters. The damn quarters. I remember I used to scavenge like mad for quarters. At the store I would make change so as to optimize my quarter return from the cashier. And I would never ever EVER actually SPEND a quarter. I'd sooner break a dollar and get 3 quarters back than save the dollar and give up a quarter.

Parking my car in metered spots would give me heartburn if the meter only took quarters.

Heaven forbid I actually make a special trip to the bank and get quarters. That would require actually TALKING to a Bank Teller.

And then I discovered that most Laundromats have quarter machines! The joy and jubilation I felt when I realized that I could go, during NON-banking hours, to a place that would provide me with copious amounts of quarters! It was a dream come true!

Sad. So very very sad.

Um, right about here is where I would start on the turning point of my story so that I might actually stand a chance of finishing this post.

Now if I could just remember what I was getting at.

Errrrr.

Heh heh. Hang on, let me go reread what I just wrote...

Ok, I think I can wrap this up now.

So, it pains me to have to do laundry at our apartment now. I'll have to forage through the apartment looking for quarters, traipse back and forth through the apartment complex every 40 minutes to rotate laundry, and hope that I don't forget and then get locked out because I ran past laundry room hours.

And then not have any clothes to wear in the morning because they are all stuck in the washing machine in the locked (until 9am) laundry room.

Gripe.

Oh.

And why am I not doing laundry this weekend at the house like the normally spoiled, laundry-snob that I am?

BECAUSE I AM GOING TO DISNEYLAND.

You totally feel sorry for me now don't you?

Poor poor Mary.

She gets to go to the happiest place on earth, and has to do her laundry in a ghetto laundry room in order to do so.

Oh the tragedy!

The inhuMANity!

But don't you feel sorry for me. No.

I am a trooper! I will come out of this victoriously and unscathed!

Because I am STRONG!

And have wine.

Plentitudes of wine.

Could it be? Is it true?

2005-09-26T15:10:00.000-07:00

Have I actually sat down to right more on the subject of TowelGirl?

Or maybe I'm just going to make more excuses for not writing more often.

In all honesty I believed that I was going to get the rest of this little ditty of a story down the next day.

And to that I utter a great big: HA.

It's been like, a bajillion days.

Let's hope I can remember the remainder of the story.

Ok. So. Where were we.

Right.

TowelGirl, the main character of this delightful tale, had just dragged me up the trail to the cabin.

Fortunately everyone was close behind and were able to stop her from going inside. You see, by now she had quite the collection of pine needles and dirt caked on her feet and legs. And apparently a cut on her foot as well that was not quite gushing but certainly needed tending to.

And don't ask me where her shoes were. This was not a literary slip on my part.

I simply do not know.

In fact, it wasn't until just now that I realized she didn't have shoes.

She either wandered down without any. Which I wouldn't put past a drunk. Who needs shoes right?

Or they're at the bottom of the lake as we speak.

Ok, so.

We towel her off outside the front door. At least to a tolerable degree so we can rush her inside to the shower.

Of which she had no interest in. Naturally.

The girl takes 3 showers a day, and NOW she's choosing to abstain?

(rather than constantly mention this in the text I would like to just tell you to assume, at all times, I am thinking "need more wine, need more wine" over and over again. I mean, clearly. Duh.)

(except, that is, when I'm thinking "I hate you, I hate you, I hate you" over and over again)

(but you probably were already assuming that)

I finally convinced her that she must be freezing from her totally at-will, sober, and weeeee-fun, dip in the lake. That the shower would warm her up and she would thank me. I steered her into the bathroom, so she would stop bleeding on the expensively new Berber carpet, where lil' sis had already started the shower, and we tried to get her undressed.

Oh, and there came back the delightful belligerence. With a dash of modesty.

"yoooooou guuuuuuuyz...I can take caaaare of myshelllf. Shheeriously guuuuuuuyz, I don't neeeed your help"

And she pushed us out the door.

Ok fine. Shower your damn self.

Figuring that the BestFriend and lil' sis had things under control, I went upstairs to TowelGirl's room to look for a fresh set of clean clothes.

And I realize now that finding "clean" or even reasonable "fresh" clothes was a foolish thought. But at the time I assumed she must have had SOME clean clothes considering she had been using the laundry equipment all weekend long.

Oh yes, another one of her "quirks". She apparently felt right at home enough to wash her clothes over and over again. In the laundry room (which doubles as the 2nd bathroom) that has NO ventilation.

To make this absolutely clear: laundry/bathroom = sauna.

What I found in her room cleared a WHOLE lot up for me. Up until this point I was giving TowelGirl the benefit of the doubt. She drank too much. No big deal. She wasn't handling it well. But so what - I wasn't going to lump her in with Liza Minelli right off the bat.

And then I found her backpack. Which, by the way, was the ONLY item she had brought with her. She had packed all she needed for a 3-day weekend in an average sized school-grade backpack.

Which again, not entirely that odd. I might pull that off if I really needed to. But you'd better have a good reason. And you know what, better yet - don't invite me somewhere if I'm limited to just one small backpack. k?

And obviously she had the toothbrush and towel gnomes to see to her hygeinic needs...

Where was I? Oh right. I made no real judgments on TowelGirl's state up until then.

But then I took inventory of her backpack.

- 1 sketchbook (artist...or should I say "artist")
- 1 t-shirt
- 1 pair light-weight pants
- 1 sandwich, made with perishable ingredients - none of which available in our fridge (brought from home?)
- 1 baggie crammed full of some pastries we had made earlier that day
- 1 calistoga water bottle filled with a cranberry juice colored liquid (upon sniffing contents - the cranberry juice was NOT alone)
- 3 empty beer bottles
- 1 Liter of Gin...missing, like, 3/4 of the bottle

Hooookay. Drinking in private. Somewhat of an indication we were dealing with a drunk. A drunk who is worried she will be stranded with no food. And who has no concern for refridgerating food that is prone to food-born bacteria.

I grabbed the t-shirt and pants and brought them downstairs. I found lil's sis in the hall outside the bathroom waiting for TowelGirl to finish her shower.

She finally finished and we found that she had managed to, yes! shower fully clothed.

Excellent! This is why we let drunk people shower unsupervised. It's fun. And makes for good stories later.

Lil' sis produced the "clean" clothes and TowelGirl proceeded to put them on over her soaking wet lake-swimming ensemble.

Again, she was feeling modest. Nevermind she was in the midst of an evening-long humiliation. So what's the best thing to do? Put your clothes on OVER your existing soaking wet clothes.

Because this totally solves the problem.

Well at least she's now drenched in warm shower water instead of cold lake water.

And then there was the brilliant chatter she subjected us to. A wonderful combination of outward anger towards us and self-hatred introverted drunken banter.

If you recall from the previous installment of this story...you know, the one I wrote, like, a bajillion days ago...TowelGirl is notorious for her constant string of commentary. When she is drunk she does not fail to produce. Only this time it's a constant string of how silly we're being, and how she can take care of herself, and no she's not drunk, and why can't we just leave her alone?

We pulled her into the kitchen, on the nice tile floor (in other words: easy to clean should more bleeding continue, or say, vomiting suddenly commence), and sat her down on the floor to address the wounds she incurred when falling in the lake.

And boy oh boy did I want to inflict some more of my own.

We put a bandaid on the cut she had on her foot which we discerned was minor. I put an icepack on her shin which was now growing a nice big goose-egg of a bump.

I claimed a nice bit of satisfaction knowing how much that was going to hurt in the morning.

By now my Husband wandered over to survey things. Up until now he had smartly stayed out of the way.

Husband: How's the patient.

Me: I don't really give a shit - get me more wine.

Husband: Right.

Being the dutiful husband that he is, he swiftly supplied me with the best tasting wine ever.

Now that I had a glass of wine, I felt a little more at ease to talk with TowelGirl while we iced her leg.

She blubbered a bunch of things about her Dad dying of some sort of Cancer and her mother having Multiple sclerosis. She continued on about how she's about to loose her job (at Pete's coffee, ahem) and how she's a failure and life sucks.

Ok.

Right about then I was considering that it was a great time to start charging by the hour.

Fortunately for all of us TowelGirl's eyelids started to get heavy and we thought it might be best to move her to the couch where she could crash out for the night. We felt moving her upstairs was a bit optimistic on our part.

We spread out a pile of towels to keep the couch dry, pushed her down and within a couple minutes she was sound asleep. Off in little drunken dreamland.

Oh man can I be long-winded.

I really thought I could wrap this all up in one more entry.

But, um, don't hate me.

Oh god - you're totally going to hate me.

I'm going to have to leave the rest for another time.

(insert nervous laughter here)

Seriously - I mean it! I'll wrap it all up nice and tidy next time!

And next time won't be, like, forever from now. Maybe. (more nervous laughter)

Hello? Is this thing on?

2005-09-19T15:29:00.000-07:00

Sooooo...

How's it going?

Uhhhh. Heh heh.

Like, um, don't hate me.

Seriously, I'm not avoiding you. I'm not skirting around finishing up the TowelGirl story. I don't have an agenda - I'm not trying to cause any distress or annoyance.

I've just been, well preoccupied.

It's just that, well, my job...it's like...time consuming now.

Shit, well that makes me sound like I normally don't do crap.

More so than usual ok!

And I sort of made a promise to myself that I would never mention work here because I don't want to become one of those poor unsuspecting bloggers who were sacked for mentioning they even had a job and where said job was.

Even though I doubt my employers would be so lame.

But that would be an ignorant assumption. And making ignorant assumptions leads to...well...assuming ignorant things.

Or something.

So let's just say, if I HAD a job (which I'm neither confirming nor denying), that it has become rather time consuming of late.

And even though it may be time consuming - it's totally exciting, and things are changing. And if I had this supposed job where things are exciting and changing, I might be really consumed during work hours, and utterly exhausted mentally upon getting home in the evenings.

If I were employed that is.

Which I'm not saying one way or the other. Or by whom.

So I just wanted to write this note. Which is totally not during working hours by the way.

IF I had a job.

And that job had "normal working hours".

I'm still alive, and well. And maybe tomorrow I will write the final chapter to my two-part story of TowelGirl - Drunk Extraordinaire!

Does two parts of a story necessitate chapters? What would be the minimum?

Why am I worried about this?

Ok peeps...

2005-09-11T16:38:00.000-07:00

So here's the poop:

I am a bad BAD blogger.

I write this story about TowelGirl and then I drop off the face of the planet without crafting the next and final (oh god I hope) installment of the story.

And THEN?

I realize I will not be poised diligently in front of the computer for three more days because I will be in training for work.

And to that I exhale a rather large "BLAH".

Now there is a slight possibility I will find myself inspired to sit and blog. And god knows I owe all my adoring fans.

(I have, like, 2 now)

(swear!)

(no, seriously)

(would I lie?)

(ok, yes, maybe if it meant stroking my ego and to make myself feel like I actually write and someone actually cares to read)

(but I'm pretty sure that both my mom and husband read this with some slight regularity. So there! Husband + mom = 2 fans!)

And now that I have spent, like, 5 minutes writing this "quick" little note to all of you when I could have actually worked on the next installment.

But whatever.

I'm not feeling inspired to write about that right now. I claim creative license. Which pretty much allows me to develop weird and annoying habits and I can chalk it all up to my being creative and artistic. I use the words "creative" and "artistic" loosely.

Anyway. Where was I?

Oh yes - so there IS a slight possibility I may write something sooner. But then again there's all this great stuff on tv this week like the season finale of Rescue Me (Oh joy!) and the season premiere of Gilmore Girls.

So by the time I get home from hauling myself back and forth from San Francisco to San Jose during shitty rush hour...I may just sit on my ass, drink wine (obviously), and watch smut-tv.

Because I am so all about the smut-tv.

So we'll just have to see.

There is no title that aptly describes this...

2005-09-07T10:25:00.000-07:00

So sorry to drop that little juicy teaser yesterday morning and not elaborate further. But I promise, I was only looking out for my adoring fans. If I had gone into further detail given my state at the time the story would have resembled literary vomit.

So!

About that drunken debacle.

The weekend started out innocently enough. The BestFriend, The Husband, and I had headed up to Donner Lake for a weekend of rest, relaxation, and apparently babysitting. Only there were no babies in sight. Just full grown adults.

THAT ACT LIKE LITTLE TODDLERS.

The BestFriend's little sister came along with a few friends in tow. Bless her heart, she meant well. She invited these people along for some fun. But one of these friends has "issues". Issues that failed to go unnoticed until now because lil' sis has only known this "friend" for maybe a month or two.

Hell, I probably know the guy at the front desk of Gold's gym better.

At first we just started noticing little things that we chronicled as "odd". For example, apparently she thought that the only towel in the bathroom she was sharing with 3 other people was specifically meant for her. Nevermind that she had been instructed to bring her own towels. That fresh clean towel was left there. For her. By the towel gnomes.

Apparently.

It's not like it was my BestFriend's towel or anything. The gnomes left it there for her.

And what a relationship she had with this towel. All weekend long she dragged it around. Down to the lake. Into the dining room. It spent some time in each bathroom. She liked to carry it on her shoulder as she walked around.

Busy towel.

And yet she never seemed clean.

Another weird thing considering she probably took 3 showers a day.

We have since determined that she probably doesn't know how to use soap or shampoo. She didn't bring any for one. Come to think of it, a toothbrush and deodorant were missing from the bathroom as well.

Perhaps she has toothbrush gnomes that come in the night and take care of that for her?

Good lord this girl was strange.

We tried to ignore her most of the time. She just kind of came and went. With a string of constant commentary.

Yea. She couldn't shut up either. And she found everything "fascinating!" and "awesome!". Oh yes, the world is just one big fascinatingly awesome place.

I realize now that hindsight is most definitely 20/20. The events I am about to unfold cleared a lot up for us. Had we been more on our toes we might have seen it coming. But again, that whole damn hindsight thing.

Our last night at the cabin pretty much encompassed all the usual nefarious activities the previous evenings entailed.

In short: drinking.

We make no excuses. We hide nothing. We are not ashamed. We drink. Vacation: drink.

Plain and simple.

And we cook. But that's really of no concern.

So we started out the evening with a ginormous jug of Sangria. Yes, a jug.

Just in case we're unclear:

Only in this pic the bottle is totally empty.

And it's like only 9pm.

Clear now?

And then we moved on to Blue kamikazes...

And I was JUST about to move on to cracking open a bottle of white wine when it occurred to us that TowelGirl was missing.

Like we really cared.

But you know. It's kind of a good idea to keep a tab on things. Especially when we're, like, the "responsible adults".

Heh.

And that's when our attention was drawn to the dock down at the lake.

TowelGirl was down there hanging out. Probably smoking a cigarette.

So what do we do?

The only clear thing to do when you've just help down over 3 Liters of wine.

We all started to yell "JUMP!"

I should stop here and probably make it known that we were not really that trashed. Sure we had a lot to drink. But we ARE professionals here. Not only do we have decent tolerances...

We started drinking at, like, 4pm.

By this point in time we're all standing on the deck yelling down to the lake. It's dark, we can't see her.

TowelGirl: "should I?"

Again, that whole hindsight thing? Sigh.

We all shout back: "YEEEEEEAAAAA!"

TowelGirl: "I totally will if you bring down my towel!"

BestFriend (says to me): That's MY towel. Bitch.

So we all start wondering down to the dock in the dark. And it's all calm and nice out. The BestFriend and I lie on our backs and check out the Milky Way. TowelGirl didn't seem all that drunk so we weren't really concerned she was going to jump in.

And yes, by this point it HAD occurred to us that TowelGirl + Booze + JumpingInLake = BAD

But we didn't really think it was going to happen until she actually did.

And again, STILL not worried because it's not like she FELL in. And we WERE, you know, kind of, ahem, coaxing her to do it.

And then she started being a pain about getting out. And the words coming out of her mouth appeared to be slurred.

And then the belligerence started.

And then my nice wine high obliterated.

Dumb bitch.

We knew we had to get her out of the water (useful info: lake was 66 degrees). And we knew it was going to be a lame, annoying, and overall stupid experience.

After much cajoling and affirming that we did not in fact think she was trashed, and yes we knew she could swim just fine, and no we were not patronizing her...we finally got her back on to the dock and wrapped in "her" towel.

And everyone started walking back up the trail to the cabin.

And she fell in. With "her" towel.

Up until this point I actually thought (foolishly yes) that we could make it up to the cabin, and proceed with the rest of our bingefest. We had more wine and Sex and the City on DVD planned. I NEEDED to believe we were going to make it back with little intervention.

And there she was in the lake again. Yelling "I'm fiiiiiiiiiine you guys...it's noooooo big deeeeal". So we drag her heavy, water-laden, ass out of the lake again. Yea, did I remind you that she's a big girl?

Yea.

Big.

How we were actually managing to haul her out is beyond me.

And lil' sis even managed to wade in and find the damn towel too.

And then...can you guess?

Yeeeeeaaaaaa...into the lake again!

Weeeeeeee, this is fun! It's like a game!

Only this time she fell in on the OTHER side of the dock. The shallow side to be more specific. The side with the big slippery rocks.

Any shred of alcohol still numbing our senses was now permanently gone as we stood there looking at her, clearly stunned from the fall, and not standing up. Fortunately she was ok because she eventually did stand. And we lugged her back on to the dock. Did I mention how FUN this was?

Yea. Weeeeee, fun.

And I dragged her onto the dirt AWAY from the water. And then the belligerence came again.

And all the while I'm thinking "I hate you, I hate you, I hate you" over and over again. And she's being snotty and yelling "YOU GUYS I'M SO NOT DRUNK!" in a *you assholes how dare you* tone of voice.

I could have kicked her. Only I wanted a glass of wine and some Sex and the City and the only way I was going to get that was if she would just drag her fat, towel obsessed ass, up to the cabin.

I finally had to convince her that I was cold and drunk and needed HER to help me up the trail into the cabin. She quickly stopped staggering and nearly falling into the bushes, and then grabbed me around the waist with superhuman strength and hauled me up the trail.

And I'm going to get the rest of the story down later.

This is already so long I'm worried I've lost all your attention and that no one has actually read this far.

Hello?

Is anyone there?

Oh yea, that and I have work. Or some shit like that.

Man, I am just one big tease!

So now I'm "it"

2005-09-06T11:56:00.000-07:00

Seven things I plan to do before I die:
1. Finally make it to Disneyland. Seriously. No, I'm not kidding.
2. Procreate
3. Own a Bengal cat.
4. Figure out what the hell it is I want to be when I grow up. Suggestions are welcome.
5. Build a house from the ground up.
6. Retire.
7. Travel more. I know I know - I'm SO original.
Seven things I can do:
1. Gut a fish. It's totally icky.
2. Wield a jackhammer among other scary power tools.
3. Avoid knitting projects quite effectively. Even though I enjoy knitting. Go figure.
4. Drink caffeinated beverages right before bed. I'm wide awake right about until I decide it's time to sleep.
5. Make a mean cornbread.
6. Produce a flame from a Bic lighter using my index finger instead of my thumb. Go me! You try it OK!? It's NOT easy. Whatever.
7. Fix the copier at work. No one else is capable apparently. Maybe I should go work for Xerox. Oh! Maybe THAT'S what I can do when I grow up!
Seven things I cannot do:
1. Sew worth a damn. I can use a sewing machine yes. But it's not pretty and does not usually involve straight lines.
2. Voluntarily touch a spider. Or go near one for that matter. Within 5 feet? Too cozy for me. Spiders deserve their space. (shudder)
3. Jump off, out of, or from anything that is at an extreme height (i.e: more than 5...make that 3 feet). I don't care what kind of fancy contraption you strap to me. Forget it, uh uh, nope, absolutely not gonna happen.
4. Figure out what the hell I want to be when I grow up. Apparently I have to figure this out before I die. I hear being a copier repair person is rewarding.
5. Get excited about going to meetings. They suck the life out of me. Slowly.
6. Figure out if this guy is for real or not.
7. Get this damn song out of my head. Incidentally sung by the guy from the previous line item.
Seven things that attract me to the opposite sex:
1. Sense of humor
2. Having his shit together
3. Nice ass
4. Someone who actually laughs (I have dated a laughless breed. It sucked. 5 years of thinking I had NO sense of humor. And maybe I don't - but at least my husband humors me!)
5. Expansive intelligence (I like a good combo of both useful and useless knowledge)
6. Motivation
7. Hands. Big strong hands.
Seven things I say most often:
1. "Seriously!"
2. "Shut up!
3. "You know what I was just thinking?" (this usually scares my husband)
4. "What the HELL?"
5. "Lame."
6. "Huh?"
7. "You can find me under my desk taking a nap."
Seven celebrity crushes:
1. Heath Ledger (oh. my. god.)
2. Joseph Fiennes (I will forgive him the tights - it was Shakespeare after all)
3. Russell Crowe (again: oh. my. god.)
4. Zach Braff
5. Joaquin Phoenix (although his incestuous behavior in Gladiator sort of weirded me out. I don't care if your sister is hot. Nor do I care that it's during the Roman Empire. It's just not cool.)
6. John Stewart
7. Shane West

I'd say I caught my limit this weekend

2005-09-06T11:38:00.000-07:00

I am so hung over from this weekend.

And I don't mean that in a waaaaahooooooooooooo! we drank too much, stayed up to late, and partied hearty sort of way.

I mean that in a grrrrrroooooooaaaaaan...we drank too much, stayed up late, and fished wagon-abandoning drunken alcoholics out of the lake and tried to prevent death and mayhem sort of way.

Well, there was actually only one alcoholic we went fishing for. But that was one more than I had planned on.

And boy was she a charmer.

And she weighed a lot.

A lot.

Seriously.

But I will return to this story later. Because I suck. And because my brain is SO not working right at the moment.

Working right for ME ok?

I am going to return to my cup of coffee and maybe tackle one of these things I've been tagged with. I'll get back to this delightful topic later. When I'm not busy resting my head on my keyboard. Just for one second...

You know what would be so nice right about now? My bed. Oh yes. With the softness. And the warm comfortingness. Can't forget the pillows...the soft cushy pillows...

Caution! Immigrant Crossing?

2005-08-26T11:58:00.000-07:00

A sign like this exists? And it's being used as a SERIOUS caution?

I just love our country.

Posted near the San Diego/Mexican Border

Do you think they stop and freeze in headlights like deer do?

The Obsessive Picker

2005-08-26T10:11:00.000-07:00

We'd finally made it to Colorado and were having nothing but good luck. We effortlessly found our way to the baggage claim JUST as our two bags popped out onto the turn-style. That's really all that happened that could be considered lucky. What can I say, I'm easily amused.

Which you probably already have figured out based on what asinine things I write about.

Come on! Be happy for us! If you've ever had a bag lost or detained somewhere I'm sure you are cheering and clapping your hands. Or not.

Whatever.

We grabbed a rental car at the airport and decided that since we were not fed on the plane (yea United!) and it was now past our lunchtime, some good eats were definitely in order. And with that we braved downtown Denver which really isn't all that bad. There's a lot of pavement, with lines, and then there are lights hanging from cords. Every once in a while there's a sign that tells you something fascinating like "stop" or "no left turn" or "pay your taxes". Very plain and simple.

We had picked a BBQ joint that was recommended by a friend of a friend (thank you Emilie!) that was way down one of the main drags. So we sat in light traffic waiting at stop lights. You know, the usual mid-afternoon downtown city driving. Naturally, being the passenger, I spent a good amount of time checking out the sites and people watching.

That is when I discovered the Obsessive Picker. She seemed innocent enough, driving her mildly beat-up hatchback with a small pile of crap in the back seat. Nothing out of the ordinary there. Nothing except for what she was doing.

Ick.

I still cringe when I think about it.

As if the nail clipping wasn't enough? I had to witness someone, not more than 5 feet away, POPPING ZITS on her NOSE in her vanity mirror.

Oh God. The mere nastiness of it all. I can still see it like it was moments ago. There she was just oblivious to the lines of cars surrounding her.

SQUEEZING her nose. And then she'd pull her hands away and inspect her nails for the treasure she just extracted from her pores.

Then wiped it on her shirt.

Naturally I've already grabbed the Husbands arm and gestured in her direction.

So by this point if she were to actually stop her obsessive picking and looked in our window she would see me, with a look of HORROR on my face, and my husband cracking up in the driver's seat.

Then the light turns green.

We all drive forward for another block and stop at the next red light.

Guess who we're sitting next to?

Like the Blog Gods just sent her down for me to witness.

But she wasn't squeezing blackheads on her nose anymore.

No, she had moved on. Must cover more surface area you see. Perhaps her nose was sore. Maybe she ran out of zits. Or possibly she just got bored and decided to move on.

Move on to picking zits on her ARMS.

And I continue to stare like there are two 10 car passenger trains headed for each other with a Bus stuck on the tracks in the middle.

Picking and squeezing.

And she's picking at obviously already aggravated sores! And how do I know this you ask?

Because I am sitting RIGHT next to her in my seat - I am SO close I can practically see the pores she is assaulting. And does she NOTICE that there are other people in plain site who can see this horrible display of grooming gone wrong?

Apparently no people, she does not.

So I would like to issue this plea. A plea to all of you out there who treat your car as if it were your bathroom. Who have mistaken your vanity mirror for your bathroom mirror. All of you nose pickers, ear wax harvesters, pimple extractors.

WE CAN SEE YOU.

Yes, we can see through glass. And not just some of us have this mystical power - ALL of us can see through glass.

So please. PUUULEEEAAASSE. Wait until you get home. Do not share this part of your grooming routine with us. Because we will watch. With sick horror on our faces.

And then we will blog about it.

What did I tell you?

2005-08-26T10:08:00.000-07:00

So I went and stepped on the scale the other day with reckless abandon. Just went and stepped right up like I owned the place or something.

And what did it do?

It said I weighed 1.5 lbs more than the day before.

See? Do you SEE?

You have to sneak up on it or it will be mean and cruel and not particularly care about your feelings.

Old Man Drunk

2005-08-25T10:08:00.000-07:00

Oh lovely Colorado.

Went there last weekend with the Husband to visit my folks. The trip was, for the most part, what anyone might expect from a four day weekend with one's parents. I won't bore all of you with details from that.

I'll just bore you with details from other aspects of our trip.

We got to the airport in good ol' Sac town and discovered that United, being the delightfully charming and oh-so customer savvy airline that they are, had decided to book us in seats 10 rows apart.

Oh, and it doesn't stop there. Naturally, we each got a middle seat.

Yea United!

Both of us tucked away into our seats, my husbands knees (I safely assumed) wedged nicely against the kidneys of the passenger in front of him. I pulled out my iPod and tried to tune out as much as possible. (for the record I was not trying to be witty with that little "tune out" remark but afterwards I realized it might look that way and I wouldn't want any of you to think that I was campy in a grandpa sort of way. I mean I AM, but there's no reason to dwell. Sort of like what I'm doing here. Dwelling. Look at me dwell. Dwell dwell dwell.)

I quickly noticed, as I was "tuning out" that the old man next to me seemed a little odd. But he was old. Old sort of predisposes us for oddness. I mean, "old" and "odd" are practically the same word.

First of all he was wearing a suit. Which isn't all that odd really considering that there used to be a time when everyone dressed nicely for flights. As I thought this my eyes darted to the girl in 18D with her cloud pajama pants, gut hanging out of a skin-tight shirt that read "Hot Mamacita", and little fuzzy slippers.

But the thing that struck me as odd was that his hands looked CHEWED on, complete with 4 bandaids on varying fingers. That and he seemed very protective of his jacket which he had already taken off and was clutching to his lap.

Soon I found out why.

Turns out his jacket wasn't a jacket at all. It was in fact a bar. A bar that apparently only served whiskey and brandy.

Out of the corner of my eye I spotted him fishing around in his jacket pocket. Then he - oh so stealthily - pulled out a one-shot bottle of whiskey, screwed off the top, and downed it in one gulp. All while gripping the bottle in his hand so that no one would know what he was doing.

Uh huh.

I had NO idea what he was doing. No siree.

One bottle of whiskey down and I start analyzing the situation.

Me: Do we have a nervous flier here?

Me again: Well, not necessarily - hell, if I had thought to stock up on shots of Maker's Mark I'd be doing the same thing right now.

Me: Maybe he's an alcoholic?

Me again: Given that comment I just made about Maker's Mark that would mean WE'RE an alcoholic. Split personality syndrome yes - but alcoholic?

At this point in time I felt there was not enough conclusive evidence to diagnose the man a nervous flier. Instead I imagined that he was someone who appreciated whiskey. All the time. Or, perhaps he thought it was 10:30 at night rather than being 10:30 in the morning like it was.

And then out came another shot.

Of course, since he is so stealth-like, it just looked like he was twisting one hand over the other (like he had a pepper grinder in his hands, or perhaps, gee, like he was opening a tiny bottle), and then lifted his fist to his mouth and tipped his head back (sort of like he, oh I don't know, was maybe drinking something from a small bottle ensconced in his hand?).

Whiskey shot count: 2

Right about now we started taxiing out to the runway which was, in my opinion, the moment of truth. Were we dealing with a nervous flier here?

Bingo.

Out came another shot.

And by the time we made it out to the runway and began final preparations for lift-off - another shot.

Whiskey shot count: 4

He probably would have had another shot during actual lift-off but he was old, frail, and probably couldn't manage to both drink and be inconspicuous about it. So instead he clung to the armwrests and pressed his eyes shut.

We finally leveled out and before the seatbelt light went off...can you guess?

Whiskey shot count: 5

So now my little buddy has got 5 shots in him, having offered NONE to me I might add, and seems to be pretty tame. I wasn't too concerned that he would be a mean drunk, he seemed too small and squirrelly to be mean. To the point, he just seemed like the product of years of taking abuse from a really mean bitch of a wife.

But what I didn't see coming was the horror of all horrors. Something I could never have predicted being that it was so, well, UNPREDICTABLE.

Into his pocket he reached, and out he pulled a pair of nail clippers.

Yes, nail clippers.

And then he proceeded to, yes, clip his nails.

His thick, peeling, yellowing nails. And oh boy, I'd agree they needed a good trimming.

But there?

On the plane?

With ME right NEXT to him?

Let me just make this perfectly clear. I don't particularly think cutting one's nails is gross or disgusting. It's just practicing good grooming, which BELIEVE me - I totally like. Good grooming skills are important.

But I believe there is a time and place for everything. And clipping your nails on a plane when you are in close proximity to over 100 people is not what I would consider the correct "place" for this "thing". When a nail might SHOOT off at a high velocity and stab a very nice girl, who was JUST trying to mind her own business, in the CORNEA.

And it's making that CLIPPING noise. The one that everyone recognizes as a nail clipping noise. And I'm looking around and seeing that people are slowly noticing the sound.

CLIP!

Looking up from their books, stopping their conversations...

CLIP! CLIP!

Turning their heads to try and see what UNCOUTH MORON is clipping his NAILS on a plane!

CLIP!

And all I could think about was how I did NOT want a nail lodged in my eye ball. How I would have to go to the doctor and get eyedrops like I did when my cat scratched my eye (totally another story) and how eyedrops suck because I completely suck at putting them in. How the term "putting them in" is really a creative exageration on my part unless you consider drooling eyedrops all over my cheeks as getting them in my eye. And how when I succeed at getting ANY of the solution in it just burns and makes me tear up.

And finally he finished.

By this point I was ready to TAKE his whiskey from him and should he try to fight me I'd give him one of those *stop right there and no one gets hurt* kind of looks I'm sure his wife gives him all the time.

But the stewardess came to take our drink orders. And gosh, what do you think he ordered? A beer. And then he called the stewardess back to get a glass of milk as well. Milk? MILK?

Oh no.

I'd heard of this before. But I'd never actually seen it done. He took the milk, fished a tiny bottle of brandy out of his pocket, and spiked his milk with the liquor. Why milk? Why on God's green earth milk?

He cracked open another bottle of whiskey, threw that one back.

By the end of snack hour=
Whiskey shot count: 6
Brandy shot count: 1
Beer: 1
Milk: 1

The rest of the flight was as you can imagine...it was only a 2 hour flight so we were preparing for landing not that long after our drinks. The fingernail clipping bastard downed another shot before the seatbelt lights went back on. Chugged another one right before our final decent.

We finally landed and I was thankful that I had managed to avoid getting a fingernail lodged in my eye. Something I'm always thankful for after landing. Really.

And then I notice in my periphery that he is, yet again, drinking more whiskey. And I'm wondering just how MANY bottles he can fit in that magical jacket of his? And why doesn't he just get a fucking FLASK? An IV perhaps? And since he had so many why didn't he offer any to me? Hmm? Rude.

And then he starts talking to me. Mind you we have exchanged no words up to this point. 2 hours next to each other and the only words I hear come out of the man's mouth are "I'll have a beer" and "could I have a glass of milk too?".

But apparently us having landed has relaxed him a bit, so he decides to makes friends with me.

Sigh.

Drunk Bastard: My connecting flight is out on Concourse C

Me: Really (smiling in a leave-me-alone sort of way)

Drunk Bastard: Oh yea, I've made this flight a number of times and it's always out in Concourse C. Yup. Always is.

(clearly you never get USED to flying)

Drunk Bastard: Normally I have at least an hour to get there. But today I only have 30 minutes.

(fascinating)

Drunk Bastard: I even asked the person on the phone when I booked the flight "normally I have over an hour - why do I only get 30 minutes this time?"

(I'm sure it was a personal affront on his part to annoy the piss out of you...)

Drunk Bastard: He said he wasn't sure.

(Ok, seriously, we've been sitting here for like 5 hours - how hard is it to open the FUCKING PLANE DOOR?)

Drunk Bastard: So I guess I'll just have to rush and hopefully I'll still make the flight.

(is he going to have enough booze to last through his next flight? Holy cow - how many more bottles does he have IN that jacket?)

And then the door finally opened and we all deplaned. All of us happy to be out of our seats. Some of us a little groggy, others a little buzzed, and one of us with shorter fingernails.

Final Shot count: 10

The Mary, Husband, and the BestFriend Variety Show!

2005-08-24T11:15:00.000-07:00

I came across this pic and I thought I would post it. The Husband just created a new blog to PUBLICLY BROADCAST our inability to finish projects we so foolishly start and had this in his profile.

This is what my husband looks like when he's had to much exposure to me and the BestFriend:

Notice the way he holds his hands to his head in an effort to keep his brain from exploding. He has much practice at this. The feared aforementioned explosive head syndrome is a concerned side effect of participating in a conversation with the BestFriend and I. So sometimes he holds his head to prevent said syndrome.

What you don't see in this picture is the BestFriend EATING MY LAST CINNAMON ROLL. Whatever. Bitch. But I'm sure I ate some cheese and bacon shortly after putting the camera down to soothe my pain.

Bad mary! Bad! BAD!

2005-08-24T10:54:00.000-07:00

Don't go away! Come back - come BACK!

I didn't mean to neglect all of you Blogowers (Blog+Followers=Blogowers...aren't I creative and charming?! See! I can make up Blog vocabulary TOO. Or...Blogulary. Ha!).

So my last brain dump was on the 12th. Which was like forever ago. I am such a failure.

I've let you all down.

Clearly my lack of dedication and commitment to boring you on a fairly regular basis deserves nothing but abandonment and disregard.

But I deserve a second chance! Please! Don't go! Stay, read, roll your eyes, groan! I promise I have more stuff coming. I'm crafting witty, charming, and mildly captivating stories as we speak.
At least I'd like to THINK I am capable of writing anything that can be even remotely described as "witty", "charming", or "mildly captivating".

And who knows. Maybe if I stop writing this groveling little plea I can get back to my REAL stories and post something later today.

Maybe.

Just DON'T go away.

Animal House, Installment III

2005-08-12T10:09:00.000-07:00

Took me long enough to get around to writing the final chapter didn't it.

Whatever. I claim artistic license.

Last we left off with the threesome (review here), the two cats were ignoring the evil red-eyed cat-eating alien (aka the bunny) because meowing through the bedroom door at us at 3am is much more exciting.

Thank God it was Friday because that meant we wouldn't be home all weekend to listen to their meowing through the door.

And apparently there ARE small miracles in life because by the time we returned on Sunday they had forgotten ALL about the magical place that is the bedroom with all it's fresh tuna and endless supply of catnip and sisal furniture.

And they forgot that the bunny is an evil red-eyed cat-eating alien apparently too:

One big happy family.

Where did all the good ones go?

2005-08-10T09:54:00.000-07:00

As we have already discussed, moving offices brings about change. There's the different surroundings, the new commute, serene blue stripes, different places to eat. But what I did not touch upon was my change in gym.

Because who the hell cares?

So I have to go to a different Gold's gym now on my lunchbreak. Whoop. De. Do.

Well now I have a story to tell about it.

So now you're going to care. That's how this works.

It was just an average day on Friday. I made my way over to my new Gold's at lunchtime like usual. I pull my car into a spot and out of the corner of my eye I see some guy walking by. I think nothing of it. I open my door and I hear him say something. Confused that he's talking to me because I do not KNOW him I make the mistake of looking right AT him.

For those of you who may not understand why this was a mistake...making eye contact with random people in a Gold's gym parking lot is a BAD thing. There are weird freaks that workout there. To elaborate, Gold's is a non-family gym. It's where a lot of serious weight lifters work out. These are the actual reasons why I go there - no kids running around and if by some chance I want assistance with weights there is usually someone big and strong and more than happy to help. But it also means there are CRAZIES there. The ones that are break-out dancing in the middle of the gym floor to their headphones. The nutjobs that wear black-out liner under their eyes (a-la football linebacker) when there isn't a blazing sun in sight (oddly enough there is a roof and walls on the building to fix that problem). There are the cornrows, the guys wearing matching outfits, and the thong bathing suits worn on the outside of the spandex shorts. On men.

And occasionally there are the muscle heads who's muscles squeak when they move and like to sit in front of a mirror (in PLAIN sight of everyone) just flexing their muscles. Over and over. and over.

Flex (Squeak!)

...fleeeeeex (sqeeeeeeak!)

So I usually avoid the eyeball locking in the parking lot - a common location for weird things to happen.

But I did by accident. If was Friday ok? I was in a good mood. Off my game. Let my guard down.

And because I made eye contact with this guy he repeated his question which apparently really was intended for me.

RandomGuy: I've never seen you here before - do you normally workout here?

He walks closer and I quickly note that he's one of THOSE guys. The kind that can't stand still for more than 2 seconds.

Me: Uhhhh, not usually - my office just moved so now this is my local gym.

This is suspiciously heading in the "I'm a trainer here and would like to give you my card" direction.

Shifty McShifterson (formally RandomGuy): Ah! So you work here now!

So he thinks I work AT the gym now?

Me: Uhhhhh, no...I work nearby...

Shifty (clearly not listening): What's your name?

Me (hesitantly): Mary

Shifty: Hi Mary, I'm Andre!

Insert sales pitch here.

Shifty: Wow, you're really cute! Can I get your phone number? Would you like to go to dinner with me sometime?

HUH?
1. He wastes NO time
2. Totally did NOT see this coming.
3. Mental note: absolutely under no circumstances make eye contact in gym parking lot again. Must work on aloof, autistic-esque, introverted toe-staring at all times.

Me: Um, yeeeeeeeeaaaaa - I'm married. But thanks anyway.

Must get away!

Shifty: You're married?

Like he's going to talk me out of it?

Me: Yea.

Can this be over now?

Shifty: Aw man! See what's up with that? All the good ones are taken! How's a guy like me supposed to find a good one if all of 'em are taken!?

Ok, first of all - you have determined I'm one of the "good" ones by finding out that I work in the area and my name is mary? Secondly...

what does that make YOU Mr. Shifty?

Me: Yea, good luck with that.

And I walk away - staring at my toes.

A real charmer that one was. Wonder why he has problems with the ladies.

On a side note.

Do any of you subscribe to the theory that if you step onto the scale slowly that maybe you'll get a lower number? Like maybe if you do it slowly it won't notice you got on? Or if you get on it too fast and abrupt that you'll send it sailing WAY past your true weight and the needle will get stuck - giving you some horrible answer?

Because I totally do.

Bacon, Biscuits, Wine, and Fontina - the 4 Food Groups

2005-08-02T11:52:00.000-07:00

Let me take you back a few weeks to that wedding I blogged about. Yes, the one where we acted moronically about some cookies. The lunacy failed to end there. I meant to draw up the 2nd installment of this story sooner rather than later while I still had the momentum. But you know, life happens, offices move, we avoid knitting projects whilst drinking wine and trying to ignore weird cookie obsessions.

Here we go...on to the 2nd installment. Maybe. Wish me luck.

After making well-rounded fools of ourselves at the charming B&B the three of us wandered on to the next event of the evening - a beach bonfire. Nothing to report here. We sat, we drank, we avoided getting caught on fire, we made our way back to the house we were staying at. Bottom line: we behaved ourselves which means no fodder for my blog.

But do not distress!

Upon returning home we had discovered that it was not only early, but the fingerfood we had snacked on at the post rehearsal dinner was not going to cut it. Not only that, but we had no food (of the junk variety) or drinks (wine) to keep us through the weekend. Clearly a trip to the grocery store was in order.

It didn't take long to find a foodstore of suitable size and before long the BestFriend and I were strolling up and down the aisles with a cart, the Husband off in some other area searching out cookies. Ok, to be more specific, it was the aisle that contains the wine that we strolled. Three bottles of wine in the cart, we moved on to the refrigerator section in search of bacon.

Wine? Check.

By this point it had already been decided that we would need to have bacon as a snack once we returned home. Mostly because the BestFriend and I had determined on a previous weekend that if you bake bacon in the oven on a broiling pan you get the most perfectly crisp, scrumptiously nummy yummy bacon. Seriously. Never going back to pan frying.

Bacon? Check.

After acquiring the bacon, the Husband returned from his trip searching for cookies. After dumping two bags in the cart he grabs some Cinnamon Rolls of the you-bake-it variety. Which drew my attention to biscuits which sat innocently nearby.

Me (to anyone who cared): You know what goes tasty with bacon?
BestFriend: No, what?
Me: Biscuits. I think we need biscuits.
BestFriend: Oh totally.
Biscuits? Check.

Next thing we absolutely needed was Fontina cheese. Don't ask me why - it's just the best damn cheese ever. If there was ever a cheese I was going to just sit around and snack on, that would be it. Given that BestFriend is in total agreement with me on this opinion we headed over to the cheese section - picking up some orange juice and crackers on the way. Naturally.

Fontina Cheese? Check.

Our cart full of sundries that would make any stoner rouse from their daze, we made our way to the check-out and headed home.

Where we drank wine, ate biscuits, cinnamon rolls, fontina cheese and crackers. And yes, we ate it all. Well only half the package of bacon.

But let me caution you, whenever eating around the BestFriend, be careful to guard whatever it is you're nibbling on. If you eat too slowly she'll wait until you're not paying attention - which at this point in time when the story is being told is like, all the time, because by now I had consumed approximately 1 margarita, 1 beer, and 4 glasses of wine. And then she'll steal your last cinnamon roll. And stuff the whole damn thing in her mouth before you can stop it.
And then smile for the camera.

(click to enlarge so you can read my chicken-scratch comments)

Bitch.

But at the time I was unphased. I had more bacon to munch on and the attention-span of a knat given my buzzed state.

(Ditto)

And that was our way of fulfilling the four food groups.

I kid you not - we are full-fledged adults. We have jobs, pay taxes, own property, and flounder around with responsibilities like the rest of you.

Go figure.

Moving Offices: Sucky and Simultaneously Cool

2005-08-01T15:44:00.000-07:00

So moving my office from the hot, dry, boring underbelly of the Bay Area (aka South San Jose) to the more trendy, charming, and uber hoity-toity town of Los Gatos has been energy-sapping and creativity-stifling. But not without it's disadvantages in the long run. Sure I've been running around like a mad woman for the past week, covered in dust, trying to make sense of all the boxes. But now I have 16 more square feet! Yes! I now have an 8x8 cube rather than the 8x6 I had before. A cube I couldn't roll my chair around in without either hitting a wall or rolling out the door. And you're probably thinking how sad and miniscule 16 sqft is. Well you try increasing your working space by a third and then tell me about it.

Ok fine, it's still pathetic. What do you want? I work in a cube. I have low expectations and am easily charmed.

That and I have a cool blue stripe on my wall that is both calming and serene.

So here I am in my new 33% larger cube, unpacked, feeling serene, and I realize I haven't blogged in, like, 5 months. My fanclub (of maybe one person) must be feeling horribly deprived. (love you mom).

Did I mention I am now in hoity-toityland? Oh it is so nice. There are actual places to EAT here! Yes! I am no longer forced to choose between BoringChainRestaurant #1 and BoringChainRestaurant #2. There are cutsy little "cafes" and "deli's"! And everywhere around me are huge beautiful homes to remind me of just exactly what I will never afford for as long as I shall choose to remain here!

It's fab!

Word on the knitting front: uhhhhhhhhhh...

Let's change the subject.

Ok, ok. I'll admit it. I haven't been working as diligently as I once was on the afghan project. And if by "working as diligently" means "not at all", then I am being nothing but honest with you.

And, oh for shame! I cannot lie to you - my adoring Blogowers - I went to a JoAnn Fabric yesterday and bought yarn.

Yes! I bought yarn. Yarn that has nothing to do with UnFinishedAfghan #1 NOR UnFinishedAfghan #2. Did I not mention there is an UnFinishedAfghan #2? My bad. There is.

Oh the foolishness of it all.

So now I'm sinking into that pit. You know the one.

THAT pit.

The one where you start in on a new hobby and then start shopping for it even though you don't particularly NEED anything for it. And then you become a COLLECTOR of the hobby materials. You may not even actually partake in the hobby anymore - but you still BUY things for it. It's like you think that tomorrow, when you have a free moment, you are TOTALLY going to work on it. And these new materials? Absolutely needed.

There we were at the new ginormous JoAnn's near our house, buying fabric for yet ANOTHER project. (One we might actually stand a chance to finish - but totally on another topic irrelevant to my blathering-on here). And I think to myself:

Me: Look at ALL the knitting stuff they have here!

Goodie-goodie side of the brain: you don't NEED any knitting supplies - you have all you need to work on your current projects

Me: who the fuck cares - let's go touch the yarn!

And it was then that I made the mistake. I wandered over into the knitting section with no boundaries for myself in place and there was the most softest, plush looking yarn I have ever seen.

And it was on sale.

For those of you who are fellow pitt-dwellers you know of the dangerous waters I am treading at this point.

Me: ooooooooohhhhhhh, what do we have here? It's so soft, and so cheap, and gosh-darn it I must have it for a scarf that I need to knit for no particular reason other than to just knit one.

Goodie-goodie side of the brain: seriously, just back away - the yarn is not needed! We have other projects to finish for no particular reason other than to be obsessive-compulsive.

Me: oh whatever. Why do I even talk to you?

And I took the soft, nubbly, on-sale yarn and bought it!

And now it's sitting in my craft room. Amongst all my other hobby-affiliated items. And at this point I'm still convinced I'm going to use it and it will be the most soft, wonderful, cute scarf I have ever knit. Because I have never actually knit a scarf.

Anyone wanna take bets on whether I'll actually use it?

Discriminating Cookie Monsters

2005-07-22T09:48:00.000-07:00

Wedding #3 was two weekends ago which concludes this year's weddings for me.

THANK GOD.

I am ready for a break from all the formal social gathering where I have to gush during the vows, make small talk with people I haven't seen since high school, and try to figure out the enigmatic paradox of just HOW do you balance an appetizer plate and wine glass and actually manage to EAT the appetizers without sticking your face in the plate...while teetering in high heels (cute ones by the way).

If you're reading this and just about to drop an invitation in the mail to me, please ignore me. I'm a whiner. I will be more than happy to doll up in my little wedding outfit, gush, teeter, gab and somehow eat appetizers (although how I'm still not sure). And all the while I will do it without whining. Promise.

So wedding #3...

The husband, the BestFriend and I packed up and headed down to Carmel Friday evening for what turned out to be an entertaining 2 days of consuming copious amounts of wine, bacon, cheese, and biscuits. Why the interesting array of food you ask? Because when you go shopping at 11pm on a Friday night for light snack foods for the weekend (and after already imbibed one or two glasses of wine) you tend to shop like a stoner. But I will get to that little tidbit of a story another day.

Upon arriving in Carmel we shuffled off to the post rehearsal dinner schmooze-fest. The dainty affair was held at a delightful B&B a few blocks from downtown Carmel. I'm sure you can imagine how quaint and charming it was, including all the duck decoys, knick-knacks, and hand-made quilts to make Grandma proud. We schmoozed, drank wine, ate cookies.

Ohhhhhh the cookies...

The BestFriend brought these cookies to my attention. They were fluffy yet chewy, sweet and chocolatey, and there was drooly caramel tunneling through them. Ohhhhhh the nummy nummy cookies...

Naturally I had to make my way over to the source of these cookies, which were on the coffee table in front of a Laura Ashley print davenport. I use the word "davenport" because I'm sure, in a place like this, "sofa" or "couch" is just plain inappropriate. So, the husband, BestFriend, and I make our way over to the davenport and sit ourselves right down in a row in front of the basket of cookies.

We proceed to eye them carefully. We have to pick just the right one you see. Being that I'm not the sort to binge myself on large quantities of cookies I had to choose just the right one.

In other words, the largest one with the best ratio of chocolatey-o-liciousness and caramel-ly ooze.

Then the unthinkable happens...

Random person walks by and drops THIS bomb: "Oh, those cookies are SO good - you should try one. The oatmeal ones aren't as good as the chocolate chip ones though..."

Oatmeal? Did she say OATMEAL? I didn't see no fricken' oatmeal cookie intruders!

BestFriend and I look a little closer and realize that there are cookies in the basket that look distinctly like they have OATMEAL in them, intermingling with the chocolatey-o-licious ones. And they had raisins. RAISINS. I despise raisins in my cookies!

The audacity of WHOEVER put that basket together to just mix both types of cookies together, two types of cookies that look IDENTICAL. And with such abandon. Really, how cavalier!

So now there is risk involved - should I pick the WRONG (gasp) cookie, I would feel compelled to finish it not wanting to waste food. I wouldn't be able to feed it to the husband because of his whole take-me-to-the-emergency-room-now variety of lactose intolerance. I would have to eat it myself. I would not get to eat the chocolately-caramelo-y cookie because I HAD to skip going to the gym today and sat on my ass during my lunch break instead. Because the world sucks. Because life has it out for me. Because I like to worry myself about things like not eating more than one cookie instead of important adult stuff like paying the mortgage or not getting hit by a car.

But most importantly the BestFriend and I had two glasses of wine on empty stomachs and were having more fun being goofy and melodramatic about something so asinine.

So now we found ourselves trying to figure out which was which, and the husband just sat back and watched this whole bizarre debacle from behind his wine glass.

BestFriend: how about that one?

(pointing to what was SOOOO an oatmeal cookie)

Me: No, see the oats - I distinctly see oats.

BestFriend: This is unbelievable - fricken' unbelievable.

Me: I know, I know. But if we just focus, MABYE we can get through this.

BestFriend: It seems like those over there might be safe.

(pointing to a cluster of cookies)

Me: Hmmmm...maaaaaybe. Are you willing to risk it?

BestFriend: Not sure. HERE! This is one for sure!

(handing me what looks like neither one or the other)

Me: Are you sure? I mean, absolutely sure?

BestFriend: Yea.

(Notice I'm the guinea pig here?)

Me: It kind of looks like it could be oatmeal...

BestFriend: Nah, it's fine - go for it.

I take one bite. And wouldn't you know it? The gods have it in for me.

Me: It's OATMEAL!

BestFriend: Oh NO! That SUCKS! Here, try this one.

(She hands me another cookie)

Me: But what about this one?

(holding up the partially nibbled oatmeal cookie)

BestFriend: Get rid of it.

Me: What am I supposed to do with it? Stuff it down the couch cushions? (Before you think I'm a horrible house guest, and subsequently start checking your couch cushions for moldy food, keep in mind I said this mockingly)

BestFriend just looked at me, denying nor confirming my recent suggestion. I compromised and put the partially eaten cookie on a napkin on the coffee table, took the second cookie and bit into it.

Needless to say it apparently wasn't my night and the BestFriend SUCKS at picking the chocolate cookies from the oatmeal ones.

Cookie #2 goes on top of cookie #1 on the coffee table.

At this point some of you readers out there might be asking WHAT is WRONG with us. I offer you no excuses or explanations. All I can tell you is that we were two women, goofed up on some good wine with a mission to find a chocolate chip cookie in what seemed to be mostly oatmeal. And for those of you who know my BestFriend and I at all you'll know that once we set our minds to something we are determined to accomplish it. It may mean driving to 4 or 5 different stores, throwing out a batch of Baklava and starting fresh, or taking one bite out of 37 cookies before we find the one we want. But we will accomplish the set task.

By this point in time I have decided it is now up to me to pick the next cookie. And picked I did - and OHHHHHH was it good. And I picked one out for the BestFriend and she was happy. Apparently I have the cookie-picking talent. Some sort of chocolate-caramel radar most likely inherited from my dad.

And then the realization of what we had just done hit me. Two sad partially eaten cookies sat unloved, and undesired, on the coffee table. The waste! And what if someone were to see what we had done? And JUDGE us? If it were only one cookie someone passing by might think I merely did not like the confection. But two cookies with ONE bite taken out of EACH? Something needed to be done to cover up the evidence of our wreckless abandon.

BestFriend (apparently reading my mind): do something with them!

(she thrusts the cookies at me)

Me: What? What do I do? Oh my god - we can't just leave them here!

BestFriend: What about that couch cushions?

I should interject here to point out that we were giggling this whole time and none of the suggestions we made were meant seriously. At least I hope so. Who really knows.

Me: We can't do that!

Husband: What about in here?

(pointing - I kid you not - at a knitting basket next to the couch)

BestFriend: Ooooh yea! That's a good place! Do it! Do it!

Me: I can't put them in there! Someone might SEE!

I would like to interject here as well that you might notice I'm more concerned about someone seeing me hide the cookies in a knitting basket than I am about the suggestion of stashing baked goods with someone's knitting.

I put the cookies back on the coffee table. And then a plan formed in my head that was both discreet and foolproof.

I took another napkin and, in all my suave-ness, casually threw it over the cookies on the table. Then I sat back and waited a few minutes while chatting with the Husband and BestFriend. Anybody watching me would surely loose interest and not in the slightest suspect that I was trying to dispose of two perfectly good, only partially chewed, cookies. THEN I nonchalantly leaned forward, scooped up the now disguised pile of cookies, wrapped them in the napkin a little more.

And shoved them at the Husband.

Husband: what do you want ME to do with these?

(honey, please forgive me for involving you in our crazy antics)

Me: go throw them in there...

(I point at a garbage can across the room)

Husband: sigh. you guys are nuts.

He went and threw them out, like the wonderful, loving, dedicated man I know he is. I'm sure he was pondering all the while just what he got himself into when he married me. All I can say is HE proposed to ME - he got himself into this willingly.

Crisis was over! We had succeeded!

At what I'm not exactly sure. A variety of things really. Proving we are crazy, that's certain.

And after all is said and done all I can say is that I wish I had been someone else in the room witnessing this whole scenario - I'm sure we were hilarious to watch.

Little House in the Ghetto

2005-07-20T15:17:00.000-07:00

Quick word on the knitting front: it's sooooo not happening right now.
Let me tell you, finishing a project for the sake of "finishing" a project is not the best motivation. I have no use for the damn afghan when done - which doesn't exactly leave me leaping for it every chance I get. And I'd much rather be knitting something cute like a fuzzy scarf or a cuddly sweater. But I'm so stupidly pragmatic that I don't want to spend money on the materials when I have a perfectly good project already in mid-knit.
Maybe if something were to happen to the unfinished project in question. Say, it were stolen for example. If I were to one day discover it was no longer in my knitting basket by the coach right by the front door (you can't miss it). What could I honestly do? I would have to move on with my life and start new knitting projects.
Of all the things my cats get into...and for some inexplicable reason they have NO interest in my knitting.
Stupid useless cats.
But what I'm really here today to discuss is the ghetto and why it appears to be just following me around wherever I go.
Mary had a little ghetto...
little ghetto...
little ghe-tto...
Enough with the nursery rhymes.
I've written on this topic before - some of you may recall the offbeat story about WifebeaterGuy and OversizedJerseyGuy.* At the time I found it amusing that after moving just mere weeks prior to a cleaner, more "quiet" neighborhood, the ghetto seemed to follow me there. Well, it didn't stop there.
The weekend of the 4th of July (yes, I'm a timely writer aren't I?) we had stopped by the house in Sacramento on our way to our final destination of Donner Lake. We packed, we watered the plants, we stood on our porch and watched the ghetto copters fly hither and thither, we did laundry.
Now before you picture our neighborhood as a place where children sell crack on street corners in lieu of lemonade and instead of "keeping up with the Jones' " we're "keeping up with the Stoners", please bear in mind that our neighborhood is actually very clean and in a desirable, highly sought after community.
At least, I try to tell myself that while watching the cop cars slowing coast up and down the street with a copter hovering low overhead.
One minute I'm packing the car, the next I'm practically hitting the ground as a police helicopter cruises DIRECTLY overhead with an intercom spouting something unintelligible. As I'm trying to decipher why exactly a helicopter is flying so close to the ground over MY HOUSE I turn around to discover there are 5 cop cars creeping along the street coming and going in all different directions.
Now, I have a little experience with this sort of police activity. Ghetto Mary remember?
They're looking for someone.
Hoooookay - back in the house I go.
But not before noticing that the sidewalks are full of residents trying to figure out what is going on. They, apparently, are not so familiar with the ghetto.
And don't our neighbors have jobs?
Seriously? Work? Every heard of it? It usually keeps you busy at 1pm on a Friday afternoon.
Although I suppose they could be asking me the same thing. I'm a slacker ok? Whatever.
So I head inside not wanting to be a victim to what usually happens when there's a ghetto copter, 5+ cop cruisers, and a paddy wagon (yes, now there's a paddy wagon) looking around for some criminal.
And the helicopter kept flying RIGHT over our house. Nothing more comforting than a police-lead manhunt dead-ending at your house.
Let me take this moment to reiterate that my neighborhood is NICE and QUIET. (mom, this whole story is entirely fictitious. I lie. None of this happened. I'm having hallucinations...flashbacks! Just please don't call me in hysterics.)

*A note about WifebeaterGuy and OversizedJerseyGuy: they were last seen a week after the above offense chatting on the porch throwing back some brewskies, tending to the BBQ. It's always nice to see that after getting into a pushing fight and throwing collapsible furniture you can let bygones be bygones and get drunk together. Of course, I'd like to add that I was pretty disappointed later that evening when there was no show of drunken brawling, chair throwing, or scared-like-a-little-girl running.

2005-07-18T11:22:00.000-07:00

Animal House, Installment II

Thanks to my handy dandy list I remembered that I was going to write a second installment on the topic of my house and its animal-ness. Just WHAT exactly I was going to write about I'm not sure. So, you see, what we have learned here is that while lists are useful in keeping one organized, they are not of such a useful-ness if one has not added notes.

Perhaps if I recap a little on the topic at hand my memory will stop working against me and actually DO something for a change. No promises. This blog might quite possibly end up entirely in vain. But at least you, the reader, will most likely enjoy watching me struggle.

In Animal House, Installment I we learned about the beginning adventures of Boo, Bartleby, and Bunny. The Three Musketeers. The three B's. Two cats and a rabbit...

Ok, I'm stalling.

What the HELL was I going to write about?

Wine. I'm more interesting with wine. But I can't very well drink wine at work now can I? Huh. Well would anyone KNOW it was wine?

(hi mom, I'm really NOT a lush)

So the animals. Well, we crammed them all together in our quaint apartment where they hissed, growled, and stared each other down. That was, like, almost 2 weeks ago. And...

Oh yea! Victory! Halleluiah - my brain has functioned in my favor!

Ok, so, the second installment.

The following day after we moved the bunny into the apartment my landlord had to come in with a maintenance guy to fix our dishwasher. Before leaving for work in the morning I decided to leave the cats in the bedroom so they didn't torment the maintenance guy with incessant meowing (Boo) or hissing (Bartleby).

Now you see, the bedroom is a magical place. Promptly remove your minds from the gutter. I'm referring to the cats perspective. The cats are banned from the bedroom and therefore they believe it is a place where wonderful magical things take place like copious amounts of catnip is readily available, raw tuna is delivered every hour (on the hour), and all the furniture is upholstered in sisal rope and carpet. Before you think I'm cold and heartless for banning the fuzzbutts from the bedroom please take into consideration that the husband is horribly allergic to them.

So blame him.

(love you Honey)

By being contained in the bedroom for the duration of the afternoon the cats were ecstatic. They demonstrated their happiness by sleeping for 8 hours straight only stopping occasionally to clean themselves. Sleeping is a dirty business.

Upon returning home I immediately flushed the cats from the bedroom and shut the door. Life had returned to normal. Boo went to eat, Bartleby went to hiss at the bunny. And then...both cats returned to the bedroom door and sat there.

Meowing.

And they stared. And got excited every single freakin' time one of us walked by the door. And Meowed. And meowed and stared. Stared and meowed. Oh my god all evening LONG.

We cooked, we ate, we reduced our brain cell count in front of the TV. The staring, the meowing, it never ceased.

The evil red-eyed cat-eating alien - aka the bunny - no longer existed.

Never mind eating or cleaning themselves, forget water or the liter box, war, peace, starving children in Ethiopia. The cats can't get into the bedroom, call CNN.

Being the long term cat owner I had a feeling this wasn't going to be short lived. And at 4am, when the pathetic meows from the other side of the door continued I was beginning to question just how much I loved my cats. Or any cats really. Did I even "like" them? 5am rolled around and neither one of us had obtained much "sleep" if you could call it that.

The cats were determined to be let in. And I was determined to ignore them.

Here's a little peak at my thought process at 5am:
Why aren't they hoarse yet?
Do they really think that after the 782nd meow I will let them in? Are they thinking "well I can see how after only 781 meows she might not be convinced we want in, but 782 is definately going to convince her"?
I can't give in to this.
Forget all you people with your idle threats and weak spines! I am not one of you! I will stick to my guns and follow through!
I really have no choice - the husband will suffer!
But sleep is SO nice.
What is that? Are they scratching at the door now? The little shits are actually scratching at the door?
Just how much does he suffer anyway. It's just a little runny nose...and watery eyes...and the sneezing...and the itching.
There must be something I can do.
Maybe I can rig up a fire hose and drench them upon throwing open the door.
Where would I get a fire hose at this hour?
A garden hose would probably suffice. Oh, but the mess. That would be a lot of water to mop up.
What would I be terrified of if I were them. So terrified that I might stop pissing me off...

And then I thought of the most brilliant plan. Up I leapt out of bed, threw open the door, marched right over to the closet and yanked out the most horrible nasty devices I own.

Two cat carriers and the vacuum.

Both cats were nowhere to be found at this point.

One cat carrier went in front of the bedroom door. If they wanted to sit there and meow at us through the door they would have to do it while sitting next to their arch nemesis.

The other cat carrier went at the farthest point from the bedroom in the living room where I fully intended to put Bartleby, the main meowing offender, should he decide to continue the meowing. He could meow all night long (all two hours left of it) but he would do it TRAPPED where I couldn't HEAR him.

The vacuum went in the hallway to the bedroom as an obstacle for them to have to get around to get to the bedroom door.

I then retreated to the bedroom and crawled into bed. I lay waiting for just one meow. Just ONE. But nothing came. Not a single meow.

The plan had worked.

That day was the most miserable day I have had in a LONG time - minimal sleep coupled with psychological torture does not a happy day make. But I was victorious. I had put my foot down and kept it there! It was me vs. the cats and I had skunked them!

I win I win I win!

Thank god for coffee.

2005-07-13T14:17:00.000-07:00

Because I have no memory.

I'm going to write a list. Yes a list! Yea! I love lists. Lists are fun because you can cross things off of them! Oh how I love the crossing off part. I will do things JUST so I can cross them off the list!

I suppose that's sort of the point. Ahem. Anyhoo...

But most importantly I love lists because I can't remember crap. Oh sure, I can remember all kinds of stupid little trivial facts. But not the stuff that matters. So in order to sleep at night I keep an occasional list. This is how I keep myself "organized". I use the word "organized" "loosely".

Heh. Look at that! I just used the word "loosely" loosely. Isn't it great how by merely putting something in parenthesis you can use a word mockingly or sarcastically?

Was I going to write a list here?

Right.

My list.

I keep forgetting about all the things I want to blog about. And then when I have time to blog, I can't think of anything, I mope, drink wine, and watch the Family Guy. Which is a hilarious little program! But doesn't help much with the blogging. Although the wine can contribute quite well.

Sigh. Again with the not getting to my main objective.

Get to the list already!

Ok, here is my teaser list of things to come. Maybe. Depends on how my wine supply holds out...

- Seriously, the ghetto? Still hanging around.
- Animal House, Installment II
- Animal House, Installment III
- "Finishing" my knitting projects? Notice the parenthesis?
- Bacon, Biscuits, Wine, and Fontina - the 4 Food Groups
- How fad diets are ruining MY diet
- The damn MeMe that's burning a hole in my inbox

Ok, that should keep me blogging for a while. Feel free to make requests for which topic I should tackle first. Of course I will not be held responsible for any creative license I take (i.e. ignorning you). And a note to you smart asses - don't bother asking me to do installment III before installment II.

2005-07-12T14:22:00.000-07:00

Cat Collecting?

As I'm eating my lunch today I stumbled across this little story about a cat "lover".

Apparently the neighbors complained of a "stench" which is what brought this veritable cat breeding farm to the attention of the authorities.

A stench?

How about calling the po-po about the fact that it smells like the County has moved the waste water treatment plant next door?

People, there were cats crawling in her WALLS. And let us not forget she had 86 cat carcasses just lying around. Perhaps she felt that rigor-mortis was just as good as taxidermy?

Now I know how easy it can be to take on large quantities of felines. They're cute...and we've covered this, they're so darn snuggly-wuggly.

But.

Seriously, a big literary "but".

COME ON!

What sort of level of lunacy are we talking about? They started inbreeding and multiplying! Are we to assume here that this woman just went about her daily business like it was normal to uncover that, yet again, one of her cats had a litter of kittens?

CrazyCatLady: Now let's see...where DID I leave my coffee cup. Oh look at that, more kittens. Huh...darn coffee cup, where could it be?

And what about the inbreeding? Did she think the extra eyes, tails, and limbs added charm to the cats?

You can imagine my surprise when I read that not only does she have a husband, but also has a daughter. All of which who LIVED in this house. Of course this woman is, like, 82 years-old which would make her daughter roughly in her 50's if not older. Living at home with mom and dad at the age of 50? Why NOT collect cats? And the husband? What's his excuse for not running for the hills? I'm thinking that the ammonia from all the cat piss has eroded these people's brains.

And how do you sleep?

Seriously.

How?

If anyone has an answer I'd love to hear it because I only have 2 cats and sometimes they keep me up at all hours of the night and they're not even allowed in my bedroom. I think they must be doing construction work in the living room. And I think to myself they must be building me a new entertainment unit or something. And yet every morning I come out and there's NOTHING to be found. Maybe they're constructing a means to escape. A tank or helicopter perhaps?

Huh. A theory to explore another time.

Anyway.

I just don't get it. And I know that not all things in life are meant to be gotten. But seriously. What the fuck?

And THEN, after the po-po kicked her and her merry band of cat-HOARDERS out, boarded up her doors, and left to have a scone and a latte, she returned to smuggle cats out. Yes, in fact, 30 of them. What sort of vehicle do you suppose she had? It better be a big one because I can't imagine trying to cram 30 cats into my 4-door sedan.

And it is at this point that I find extreme amounts of humor in this whole situation. This 82 year-old woman trying to squeeze 30 inbred cats into her car to "rescue" them.

CrazyCatLady: Now Fluffy, move your tail just a bit so I can squeeze FuzzBuns in there - no, your OTHER tail. There we go...now I'll just shut the door...oh I'm so sorry Tiger! Did I get your leg in the door? Oh dear...well, you have 5 others so I'm sure you'll be live.

What else can I possibly say about this. The woman needs a new hobby.

2005-07-08T09:52:00.000-07:00

Animal House, Installment I

The things we do for animals. Oh the silly, inane, bizzarre and selfless things we insist on doing for furry four-legged things that can't talk. And we do it because they're cute and fuzzy and oh gosh, so snuggly-wuggly.

I am a self-proclaimed animal lover. Not in an obsessive tack-postcards-of-baby-snowseals-to-my-cube-wall sort of way. I just love animals. They're cute and fun, and well, they ARE so snuggly-wuggly.

I have two cats. In fact you can read about one of them here on this crazy cat person congregation website. I haven't gotten around to creating Boo's cat page yet. Accuse me of playing favorites all you like. In reality I was just being lazy and didn't have a picture of him on my computer (without a big glass of wine as the focal point). Please! I may be a lush, but the crazy cat people don't need to know that.

That was like 2 weeks ago and I still haven't gotten around to fixing one up. BAD cat owner!

What is this? Am I digressing?

Anyway.

My two cats rule the roost at home, which is a reasonably large small, mediumly smallish but on the larger size apartment.

Enter husband.

He has a bunny. Bunny is a white albino rabbit about ye big (holding hands out for you to see - see?) and she has, up until now, lived at our house in the suburbs.

Yes we have a house in addition to our reasonably large small, mediumly smallish but on the larger size apartment. That will be covered in another blog. Maybe.

Since we only make it up to the house on the weekends, and over the summer that's not even true, bunny was starting to "act out" shall we say. If she was a child we'd put her on ritalin, plunk her down in front of the tv and feed her enough fatty carbs to weigh her ass to the couch. But come on, let's be serious, that would be considered animal abuse.

So we decided it was finally time to combine animals at the one location where we spend most of our time so we can give all fuzzy parties concerned the attention they need. And that would be the apartment.

So Tuesday night we fetched bunny from the house on our way back from Tahoe (for the 4th of July) and made the 2 hour trek to San Jose with her in the backseat. The husband dropped me at a cooking class and he went home to clean her up and gradually introduce her to the cats. Upon returning from my class the husband had just let bunny out of the bedroom and the cats were getting their first chance at either:

a) pouncing at her,

b) becoming fast friends and doing eachother's hair or,

c) staring at her like she's an alien that just flew in from the planet EatCatsAllDayLong

...a little background on the cats. They are spoiled. They are indoor only, fancy spensive cat food fed, frequently groomed, pet, and loved - spoiled. As far as they are concerned there are only two cats in the whole wide world, a tank full of fish, and two humans. Oh, and occasionally a "visitor" that they ignore.

...a little background on the bunny. She was raised with cats. She thinks she's actually a cat. She doesn't hop, she moves her back legs independently as if she were a cat. And she has a brain the size of a walnut.

So bunny, a crazy alien lifeform to them, hops around the room nonchalantly. Boo seems to think something is not quite right. But he's cool with change. It's really not a big deal. He stays where he is, she stays where she is, and that's just fine. Should she come too close he'll just kind of walk away making a worried "Boo noise" that only Boo knows how to make. Bartleby on the other hand. Heh. I had the misfortune of HOLDING him when the bunny was actually let out of her cage. Silly me, thought if I were holding him I might provide COMFORT or SANCTITY to the little brat. Instead I got a shredded arm for the effort.

Which of course prompts me to scruff him so he doesn't either leap on my head and scratch my eyes out or leap on the bunny and scratch her eyes out. So here he is, scruffed, angry, puffed up to the nines, starring at the alien with the bright RED EYES.

And then we all made a big mistake.

We laughed.

But is was FUNNY I tell you! The little snot was putting on a hilarious show of simultaneous aggression and downright fear. How could we not laugh?

Oh brother.

Bartleby hates the laughter. He hates the ridicule when it's directed at him. Imagine a small man with equally small parts. They just don't take the laughing so well.

So he's scruffed and seeming to relax a little, and then the laughter, and I can feel him tense and get angry. He looks me square in the eyes and hisses. So I realise now that the best course of action is to let him go and he can run and hide like the scaredy little brat I know he is. But the problem is, well, he's wound up tight like a little spring and when he's like that, when released, he usually scratches the hell out of something (me) before running and hiding. Seeing as how I already received my fair share of war wounds for the night I was hard pressed to go about releasing him in as delicate way possible.

I begin to lower him to the ground and he seems to be going with it. His eyes flick from me, to bunny, to me again. I can see his brain power is spread thin between trying to figure out how to get away from me AND avoid the horribly evil unidentified white thing with legs and red eyes.

And I'm giggling - SILENTLY I should add.

Then his back legs hit the ground and instantly back up they go to SCRATCH the HELL out of my forearm. AGAIN.

People at work are going to think I'm a Cutter.

I realise at this point there is no grace in letting an irate pointy object go - so I just open my hand and off he flies. Under the table.

He's a brave one. Scared of the little bunny rabbit.

Bunny, now returned to her cage, happily snacks on some hay. Totally unphased that she is now living with two predators in possession of very sharp claws AND teeth.

The cats, now rescued from the SCARY ALIEN, spend the rest of the evening staying far from the cage. Totally unaware that there now is plump juicy Prey living with them. Totally unaware that THEY are in fact the predators in this equation. Go figure.

One big happy family.

2005-06-28T21:05:00.000-07:00

Evil knitting. Evil.

So I've taken a bit of inspiration from some of my favorite blogs and decided to take up knitting again. Apparently it's quite trendy now. Go figure.

Upon following Kristy's blog (go he'ya: She just walks around with it) I became slightly interested. At least enough to dig up some old projects I never finished. Then I came across Aunt Purl (and he'ya: Crazy Aunt Purl) and that was enough for me. I was definately going to start scrounging around in my craft room and start dusting off THOSE boxes. The boxes that I have lugged around with me for years. The same boxes I lugged from my parents house to my first hole-in-the-wall studio. The exact boxes I've convinced myself that no matter how little space I had I would HAVE to - have have have to - make room for. because why? who knows. because I made the stuff and even though it's not finished I may one day decide to finish. And ha! HA HA! Today is the day!

In these boxes, admidst all the balls of yarn that I bought for no particular project but just because they were cute and soft and fluffy, there lay two unfinished projects. Two projects of, well, ahem, slightly large proportions. Two afghans to be specific. And you know what really sucks about this idea of mine to finish up some old projects? I don't really want to work on afghans because I don't really WANT any afghans. But what I don't want to do is continue to lug around friggin' boxes for all eternity only to never finish them. Because it would be much better to lug around afghans I never use. This is where the OCD rears it's ugly head. Must finish. Must, at all costs no matter how much I don't want to, finish.

So this is what I'm dealing with here:

And here is an picture with Bartlebeast for scale:

Wine glass at my side and an episode of Friends going in the background I settled into the couch for what I expected to be a highly productive and relaxing evening of finishing my damn projects.

Oh how naive I can be. how very very naive.

15 minutes into it: huh, there appears to be markers here for a reason. interesting. I imagine at some point that reason will magically make itself known.

25 minutes into it: still not sure why the markers are here, but um, well let's just keep going.

30 minutes into it: huh, it appears to be bumpy on the wrong side. crap. not good. crap crap crap. Ok, time to make an executive decision here about WHY what I'm knitting looks like it belongs on a DIFFERENT afghan.

32 minutes into it: wine

35 minutes into it: apparently I've majorly messed this up. should have trusted instincts about markers.

40 minutes into it: ooooookay...frog time - nothing like UNdoing work you just did when the goal is, really, to be honest, to MAKE progress.

55 minutes into it: alright, back to making progress.

65 minutes into it: knit 4, purl 16, knit 4, purl 16, knit 4, purl...oh for the love of...14? why do I only have 14 stiches left?

75 minutes into it: Grrrrrrrrr

80 minutes into it: SCREW THIS CRAPPY AFGHAN

85 minutes into it: where's the husband? why does the clock say 12:37am?

90 minutes into it: SCREW KNITTING. SCREW THE EVIL KNITTING.

Summary:
2 rows added
- 4 rows ripped out
+ 2 glasses of wine =
--------------------
NEGATIVE TWO ROWS

Final Score:
Mary: 0
Evil afghan: 1

My attempt at making progress on this unfinished progress has set me back 2 rows.

And I blame it ALL on my drug dealer:

You know you want more wine mom. yum yum wine!

I knew I never should have taught him how to use a bottle opener.

2005-06-27T16:05:00.000-07:00

Oh the agony of decorating.

Friday evening, our trunk full of IKEA textiles, the husband and I drove up to the house with a short list of things we were dying to accomplish before bedtime because, well, we're sick freaks who get excited about things like curtains and wiring the new tv to the new computer. Just to get it straight, and to maintain some sense about our genders, I was excited about the curtains and the husband was excited about the new tv/computer - not the other way around.

We rolled in to Sacto at about 9pm and immediately retired to the boudouir.

And I ironed. and ironed. I think I pressed about 4000 yards of fabric. And the husband hung the curtain rods.

This is what married people do in the bedroom.

But hey - we watched porn while doing it!

Ok, so it was a porno documentary. But before you judge me for spending my Friday evening ironing curtains while watching a porno documentary, I'll have you know that it was really a big ginormous train accident that I couldn't pull my attention from. Actually it was really ginormous breasts the size of train cars if you want to be specific. If you've ever heard of Lolo Ferrari then you know what I'm talking about:

http://www.sex-freak.net/shows/shw.54.php

Ok fine, judge me - I would judge me too.

At first, as you're watching this morbidly hilarious "documentary" you're thinking - what have I come to that I find this sort of thing worth my time? Then you're thinking - I need more wine.

But as you continue to watch the film, and consequently down more wine, you begin to realize that Lolo was just an insecure woman looking for love and seeking acceptance by surgically growing her breasts to the size of small children. Can't we all really relate to that? It seems clear that she was really onto something here.

So I continued to watch (encouraged by more wine) and ironed. Then came the hemming of the curtains part which sounds easy, looks easy, and probably SHOULD be easy but I assure you it's not. Take for example the hemming tape they give you with the curtains. You're supposed to just fold the fabric over it, press down with the iron, and the tape magically turns to glue and holds the hem! But how is this supposed to work if the iron keeps turning off when you walk away to go pour more wine?

And measuring the hem - oh now that's a joke if you ask me. At first, it seemed the smartest thing to do here was to measure how much you want to cut off the end being that it's the shortest distance.

Ok, 15 inches sounds good, but let's measure twice to be sure. "Measure once, cut twice" I always say.

Wait.

Well anyway - who needs some stupid addage.

Measurement #2 - 16 inches. Huh...well, I'm thinking that the whole idea of measuring twice is to make sure you get the same measurement BOTH times.

Third time's the charm? Measure #3 - 14 inches.

Oh my god the curtain is growing AND shrinking as I'm STANDING here.

"honey - better get me some more wine, I'm going to have to stand here and ponder this for a bit"

Must learn more about Lolo.

Surprise surprise, the insecure, self-loathing woman died of a drug overdose. But if you ask me, she died because her boobs crushed her internal organs. But that doesn't look very good on the autopsy report and I'm sure the coroner just felt sorry for her mother. "Drug overdose" is much more calming.

Oddly enough, by 1pm I had actually managed to hang all the curtains I had set out to hang. And they are actually hanging evenly. Either that or my husband went and adjusted the curtain rod when I wasn't looking to make them appear that way. Hmmmm...should probably inquire.

As for the new tv project that the husband was planning on working on that evening - well, that's what we watched the porn documentary on.

wine + me = slow and inefficient, but highly amusing and entertaining

wine + husband = pretty productive considering he has the decency to wait until AFTER his project is finished to drink so that he can sit back and watch me thrash wildy with 4000 yards of fabric.

2005-06-24T10:53:00.000-07:00

I must bring the ghetto with me.

The husband and I finally called it a night around 12pm last night. But apparently that was just the beginning of monkey hour for some or our neighbors. Being that I'd lived in Downtown San Jose for about 5 years I didn't really care. Being lulled to sleep by the sound of sirens, glass breaking, and Rap music is all very typical there. But then it occured to me that we just MOVED out of downtown into the more "peaceful" suburbs and the loud screaming me-mes I was currently hearing were, well, supposedly out of place.

Nothing like the tranquil sound of "leh me go, leh me gooooo, ohmygod - leh me gooooo mofo!" to relax you into a good night's sleep.

Then the glass breaking.

For those of you who live in less than savory areas you know that this is the queue to jump up and...go to the window. Some of you might have considered calling the po-po at this point (that's what we call them in the ghetto...the "po-po"), but that requires way too much involvement. I've witnessed enough domestic disputes in my neighborHOOD to know that if you call the police you are automatically involved and have to stay up until a resolution is reached so you can give a statement. In the beginning I used to feel guilty about not calling the police - but if I really believed that what was ensueing was more than a simple dispute then I'd be on the phone.

So here we are, in our supposedly more "calm" neighborhood, peering out the window trying to figure out the details of the Jerry Springer-esque drama unfolding before us. From what I gathered we had WifebeaterGuy and his girlfriend living in an upstairs apartment across the street. Living with them is a kid who likes to yell "daddy NOOOO" a lot. Then there's OversizedJerseyGuy. WifebeaterGuy doesn't like OversizedJerseyGuy very much - we discerned this because he liked to call OversizedJerseyGuy "mutha fucker" and "cock sucka" a lot. Now we're just assuming animosity here - maybe those are pet names, but I'm thinking no. For about 10 minutes WifebeaterGuy and OversizedJerseyGuy stood really close together with their chests all puffed up saying really interesting things like "wha'd you say mofo?", "huh? huh?" and "come on bro - come on!" while pounding their chests.

Who ever said guys were bad communicators?

This dance went on for a bit and was occasionally interupted by OversizedJerseyGuy pushing WifebeaterGuy and then RUNNING the other way. I'm not kidding here. He would push, then run. This would be followed by WifebeaterGuy yelling "that's right sucka - you run bitch!". This apparently hurt OversizedJerseyGuy's feelings and so he'd stop running, turn around and start coming back to talk to WifebeaterGuy. They'd walk in circles some more - push, run, etc.

Then the girlfriend, who is on the balcony, got the grand idea to throw a wooden folding chair down at the two of them. I think she intended to only throw it at OversizedJerseyGuy, but who knows, maybe she didn't like WifebeaterGuy so much either. WifebeaterGuy starts going up the stairs because he's SO done with OversizedJerseyGuy and wants to get back to watching COPS on tv. OversizedJerseyGuy decides that the (now broken) chair makes a great weapon and starts pitching pieces of it up the stairs at the girl and the kid. We're talking PITCHING here, like pitching a baseball. Seriously, this guy had an arm. It was right about here that I considered calling the "po-po". The kid was in danger at this point and, oh I don't know, I just didn't trust his mother to protect him. But then WifebeaterGuy started charging down the stairs after OversizedJerseyGuy and he took off running. Running like a scared little girl. WifebeaterGuy hits the pavent and starts in after OversizedJerseyGuy when all of a sudden gravity got really really BAD and he fell.

Yes, he fell.

Right on his fat face.

Up until now I had grown a little bit of respect for WifebeaterGuy. He was doing a pretty good job of defending his territory. And OversizedJerseyGuy just reminded me of a Chihuahua with an attitude problem (more so than usual). But that was just sad. Sad in a hilarious sort of way.

But he rebounded! He got up and ran after OversizedJerseyGuy down the block. Meanwhile, the girlfriend took this opportunity to grab an armful of clothes and run to her car. Without the kid I might add. Mother of the year contender right there.

What fun. What a great way to wind down the evening! We crawled back in to bed and kept an ear perked for anymore live Jerry Springer action, but none came. We've been in our new place for only 3 weeks and already a domestic dispute. What a nice way to make us feel at home! I really must send WifebeaterGuy and his girlfiend a fruit basket.

Maybe I really do bring the ghetto with me.

2005-06-23T16:25:00.000-07:00

...and one more thing!

Ok, so maybe I do have a few things to write (bore) about.

What is with people and the email ettiquette? I'm speaking mainly on the subject of people you send an email to at work and why they find it necessary to rather than hit "reply" and type you a quick note back they feel compelled to call you on the phone or better yet! walk over and talk to you in person.

Let me just clarify something here. If I'm writing an email to you it is for one of two reasons:

1) I need the information documented so I can refer back to the content at a later date. But mostly so I can cover my ass and point the finger at you later.

Or,

2) I don't want to socialize with you.

It's not like I emailed you from 4 cubes away because I broke my foot and contracted laryngitis. Take the hint and just write me an email back.

2005-06-23T15:35:00.000-07:00

I've succomed. I've finally succomed to blogging.
What can I say - I was never the early adopter type. And all I can chaulk it up to is laziness tainted with a little disinterest. Not to poo-poo on any fellow (I can say "fellow" now right?) bloggers but I just didn't see what all the commotion was about. But like with all toys, gadgets, clothes, foods, planes, trains, and automobiles that I eventually came to embrace in my life, I have come to find interested in and, gasp, adopted blogging. At least, we shall see how that works out. Will it stick folks? Eh, who knows. I've often thought that I needed a writing outlet for myself to regurgitate regularly all over. I like writing, but writing and I have never exactly been joined at the hip. But maybe, MAYBE, this time it will stick.

So here I am, with my very own bit of internet to play with.

I'm not exactly sure what I'll entertain the masses with yet. Perhaps a little perspective on my average life toughing it out in a little known place called the Bay Area. Or maybe I'll dabble a little in some charming story telling about my cats.

There we go, a few nuggets about me. And aren't they enticing? I mean, really, what could be more intriguing than following along the story of a woman and her two cats. Ok, I'll work on livening it up a bit more. Maybe I'll throw in elicit drug use and wild sex parties.

By the way, Mom and Dad, if you're reading this...it's a bummer you and dad moved to CO, it was an awesome drug party we had last weekend.