Thursday, March 20, 2008

Waylaid by bronchitis... Again.

We're rounding out Week Two of this season's epic battle with bronchitis (I actually went home early yesterday and proceeded to spend much of last night coughing, which resulted in my waking up this morning with my well-hidden abdominal muscles afire). I elected to stay home today, where much of my schedule was as follows:

1.) Take medicine.
2.) Sleep.
3.) Become conscious enough to realize I cannot breathe out of one side of my head.
4.) In state of half-consciousness, turn over.
5.) Sleep.
6.) Get awakened by my mother with things she's "heard" from other people, or ideas she's gotten from extensive internal reviews of previous weddings she's attended.
7.) In state of half-consciousness, agree with whatever she says (upon further review, this may come back to bite me huge).
8.) Bolt upright in bed and proceed to actually listen to whatever she's saying.
9.) Fall asleep sitting upright, because, surprisingly enough, this is the only way I can guarantee breathing from both sides of my face.

And so on.

If you'll excuse me, I have to go repeat steps 1-5 now.

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Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Because Orson said so...

Found a gem at Every Day Should Be Saturday. I can't really align myself with the Stuff White People Like (although I totally dig on shorts, dogs, Arrested Development, having black friends, t-shirts, and grad school, and I'm quite certain I'll love Juno... maybe it can be "Stuff White People Like, and Brown People Have Been Known to Like Some of This Stuff, Too"?), so this is as close as I'm going to get.

I must give a grateful nod to lengli for first pointing out SWPL to me in her Facebook links, and to Orson for being one literary, talented lawya!

By the way, on SWPL: lol at #11!

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Thursday, March 06, 2008

The ongoing battle between Calgon and Chuck E.

I have the feeling that I may have to escape the office during lunch.

I have been fighting a sore throat and general malaise since yesterday. This morning, I woke up with a cough that leaves my throat feeling raw, along with the unmovable urge to stay in bed. I went to work anyway, where I was greeted with at least six e-mails all asking for the impossible, along with the distinct stench of coffee burnt to tar at the bottom of a coffee pot.

After tending to the coffee pot (by turning off the burner) and the e-mails (half I replied to, the other half I flipped the bird at), I made every attempt to let my dear co-workers know that I would rather not try to speak today, despite the fact that I sound just like Selma Diamond. Most were sympathetic; the small gaggle of idiots that constantly raise my ire proceeded to ignore my ill health and send calls and patients back to my office, left and right.

Excuse me? Let's send oncology and hematology patients, who are more than likely either already sick or highly susceptible to illness, to the sick-ass person suffering in the small, enclosed office in the back!

More patients coming in right now. Goodness. On goes my SARS mask.

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Friday, February 29, 2008

Arts and farts and crafts.

Sorry, but since they've been talking about it on Armsweat's little slice of blog heaven, I can't get it out of my head. That shit is good.


Takin' it higher and higher!

That's all I really wanted to do: post an image of Christopher Meloni pelvic-thrusting his way through a montage of nothing but comedic gold. The man is an inspiration.

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Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Either I have too much time on my hands...

Or I'm trying to avoid work/wedding planning/everything else. Yes, probably that.

I just signed up for that Grand Central business you see in the form of the "Call Me!" button to your right. Apparently, you plug in your phone number, and the system calls you and connects you to my assigned phone number or voice mail. And it's all free. I have yet to get a phone call in this manner; probably because I'm not quite sure whether or not I want to give out the number. But I guess that's part of the charm, since I'm not actually giving out my cell number or anything, just a number I've been assigned.

I think I was just really missing the old audio blog capability and felt like maybe, just maybe, someone will get soused enough to leave me drunken voice mails to post on the blog to be reviewed in later moments of clarity. Drunk dialing a blog? Oh, hell yes. It's starting to feel like college all over again (except without all the vomiting and early morning shame)!

And I see your mouse pointer hovering over the button contemplatively. Give in and call it, already! At the very least, we'll know how the hell this works, and your dulcet tones may be broadcast far and wide! Why am I yelling?

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Friday, February 22, 2008

Another gem from my mother.

Despite the fact that in the past six days, any and all talk of wedding planning has made me want to commit "quality matricide," as Buffy would put it, I have to share just a small thing before I retire for the evening.

Moments ago, I asked my mom what the heck she was still doing up at this hour. She then dutifully informed me that she was watching America's Best Dance Crew. An entire episode. And she had opinions on each crew competing!

"I don't understand why they call them 'dance crews,'" she said. "It's more like calisthenics!"

Oh, the whole thing was too cute; I just had to enjoy.

So kudos to Perla for her cultural immersion! Too bad she'll probably start talking politics to piss me off next.

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Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Shiny!

Okay, because I promised, here are a few pictures. I only mananged to salvage a couple from Perla's stellar photo shoot (see entry about my mom vs. electronics), especially because she kept insisting that instead of looking into the camera, we should "Look at the ring! Look at the ring!"


I refuse to call my ring anything even remotely sounding like "My Precious." And yes, I do realize that my intended proposed to me wearing what we call his "Mr. Happy Ass" t-shirt. This may give you a tiny bit of insight as to why I said "Yes!" before he finished asking the question.



Okay, Ma? Knock that "Look at the ring!" shit off already!


And here's the ring close-up. Oh, if I only knew how to really use my camera...

Great. Now everyone's seen my "Rubble Hands," which are similar to what Stumpster calls my "Flintstone Feet."

Here comes a doctor... Back later.

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Friday, February 15, 2008

I still feel like I'm going to barf a little.

Okay, long story short, because I'm exhausted from this day. And I promise I will elaborate and include photos (assuming I can get the auto-focus on the camera right), but I just had to share this with you, dear friends.

Ben asked me to marry him this evening, and I said yes!

Now, I am going to try to sleep. Very little of that happening lately. Wonder why that is?

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Tuesday, February 12, 2008

And now, to celebrate my conceding to Facebook...

And in honor of one particular Tacky Blog Lady from the Tri-State Area, I present to you... Mr. Vartan:

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Please, Hammer, don't hurt 'em.

Carry on, dears. Carry on.

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Monday, February 11, 2008

This is probably how constipation starts in most people.

Today, I was being a dutiful daughter. My mom is going to participate with the church choir again after a year's hiatus, so she has started attending practices for the Easter Vigil mass. It so happens that these practices are on Monday nights, during the same time that Ben and I attend a class nearby. So, it only made sense for us to drop her off at practice, then pick her up after class.

Upon arriving at our drop point, my mother assured us that she would call me if her friend couldn't give her a ride home. I saw this as a moot point, since we would be out of class right around the time her practice would wrap, and I planned on driving her home, anyway. She insisted, however, that if her friend could drive her home, she would call me.

"I'm going to have my phone on 'silent,'" I warned her. "I don't want my phone to ring in the middle of class. I won't know if you've called until I leave the room."

"Well," she started as she got out of the car, "Don't you have a vibrator?"

Dead silence from Ben and me for a good twenty seconds. She continued to stare at me, with little to no affect on her face, waiting for my answer.

I looked in the rearview mirror, back at Ben, who looked as if he was going to either barf, start crying hysterically or pinch off the biggest loaf in the history of loaves.

---Sorry, no image available.---

"What?" was all I could eke out after the never-ending silence.

Now, Perla was getting a tad impatient. "You know," she said as she stood there, "Where instead of ringing, your phone vibrates to let you know you have a call?" This was said, mind you, with all the annoyance of one who is quite aware of such technology. It's quite funny, coming from the woman who is famous for hanging up the cordless phone, then pointing the same at the television in order to change the channel.

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Seriously. You don't want to vex her. She will straight up bitch slap you.

"Oh, yeah," I replied, finally understanding what she really meant. "Sure. I'll have it on 'meeting.'" With that, she shut the car door and headed into her practice.

Within moments, I pulled away from the church to find parking for our class. Ben could hold his hysterics in no longer. I teared up a little from laughter, especially after we thought up some clever things I could (but never would) have said:

  • "Don't I? Who doesn't?!"
  • "Well, Ma, shit, does it really look like I need one at this point?" here, I'd be gesturing back to Ben, who would wave happily.
  • "It's in the shop."
  • "No, I put it in with our other donations to Goodwill."
  • "No, not since you bitched about how high the utility bill was last month!"
  • "Didn't you find it next to the gas mask and bottle of lube when you went through my shit last week?"
  • "Not anymore. Ben's borrowing it. Right now. Give you three guesses as to where it is." Again, I would need his assistance in this scenario. Of course, it would end with "And honestly, at this point, I don't think I really want it back."
Just file this under the new label: Stories to tell the children grandkids absolutely nobody when we're older.

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Friday, February 08, 2008

Dirtbag.

Lately, instead of calling perturbing people fucksticks or douche nozzles (or just "nozzles," for brevity's sake) under my breath, I'm calling them dirtbags. It's just been in the past few days, and I think it's because I can't get the following joke out of my head:

What's the difference between a Harley and a Hoover?
The location of the dirtbag.

Oh, well. It'll probably pass when the word "fucktard" gets back in my good graces, which is probably right after I've called people "dirtbags" twenty times before I clock out today.

Today's going pretty well. It's a slow Friday, which is almost how I prefer them. I'm not running around the office like an idiot trying to put out small fires like I often do on Wednesdays, which is the day all the doctors are here, and everyone's scrambling for room. And air. And sanity. Most of the patients coming in on Fridays are regularly scheduled for treatment on those days, and they're usually all set, just chilling in their chemo chairs, reading, talking on their cells, watching a movie, or sleeping.

Oh yeah, if I've neglected to mention it before, I got a new job last April. The fact that I'm approaching a full year at this "new job" is just crazy. I work for a bunch of oncology/hematology doctors now, and strangely enough, I really, really enjoy this job. I get to interact with patients a lot less than as a therapist, but a whole lot more than when I worked at Eviltown, USA (one of my many pet names for the job before this).

The people I work with are pretty cool, except for one person who has made it her mission in life to make her job seem more important than it actually is; and who, by her actions, makes it less and less meaningful in the process (now, that's some talent). I don't want to waste precious time on her, as it wastes my energies...

Oh, now, here we go. She just walked into my office, sat down next to my desk, and proceeded to stare directly at this screen for fifteen seconds before making up some lame excuse that she was trying to find out what music I was listening to. Oh, so it's not being a nosy, nicotine-soaked idiot who wants to pretend she has any say over me or what I do?

Now I have to cut this post short, before she comes back in here, snoops some more, then reports some tall tale to someone who actually has authority.

Effing dirtbag. I swear.

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Wednesday, February 06, 2008

Another lesson.

It's the middle of the week, and things couldn't be going slower. I've got less than three hours left at the office, and it seems like it took forever to get to this very moment...

As I typed the above statement, everything started happening at once. It is now 3:00, and I have an hour left here. In the past two hours, I have helped a patient apply for assistance through two different foundations, started rudimentary plans for starting a food pantry for the patients in our branch office, tried to get prescription authorizations: the usual.

But perhaps the most important thing I did today was listen to a patient's spouse fret over her husband's rapid deterioration. He has cancer, and he now weighs less than his own father did when he succumbed to it. She says he can barely stand now, let alone walk. Her tears are stubborn, like her, but they are there, hovering, waiting.

I look at him and see his mouth scrunched up, the lips curling inwards towards his mouth, as if he is in a perpetual scowl, or waiting for his insides to swallow him up out of existence. He sees my gaze and manages to eke out a small smile. I know it's a smile, because the twinkle in his eyes, although duller, is still there.

Their savings are dwindling; she spends hundreds a month on food, because his appetite fluctuates so greatly that whenever he has a craving for any food at all, she rushes to take advantage of those rare moments. She tells me how she could win an Oscar with the performance she puts up for him. She tries not to let the worry and fear show through on her face, especially when what he puts in his body won't stay there for very long, and he slowly fades.

Moment by moment, he disappears, and disappears, and disappears. She says it's not a matter of how anymore, but when, and she doesn't know whether to be relieved or disappointed when the next day comes, then the next, then the next.

This sturdy woman, shorter than I, forever clad in muumuus of varying purple shades, always bringing the staff Thank You cards, little deli trays, boxes of candy in gratitude, summarizes her life with her husband: a mix of anticipation and dread, hope and despair, everything and nothing. Their whole life together is no longer defined by who they were when they married, who they grew into when they raised children, or who they became in their careers. Their life is now defined by phone calls to case managers, scheduling scans and appointments, budgeting to afford prescriptions, gas, life. It's about calling the immediate family together to reminisce, to say goodbye without using the actual words. Their life is now about preparing for a future together, different than what they'd planned for before... dreading the time they know will come.

Then, a future apart... A future without each other.

A future alone.

I look at her. I can't see her without seeing him, and can't think of him without thinking of her. That day will come when I won't see him anymore. I may see her once or twice after that. Soon I won't see her, either.

After talking with her, and watching her struggle to keep a stoic face, and him struggle to, for her sake, pretend he doesn't see her struggle, it seems ridiculous for me to complain about time creeping by. It's trivial to complain about far away parking spaces, encounters with people who do stupid things, running out of diet root beer in the break room fridge. It serves no purpose, really, to get bent out of shape over something said by a loved one in a tone you don't quite grasp, or to worry, worry, worry about tomorrow, next week, next year. All that energy wasted, when it could be used to appreciate right now.

None of it makes sense, and it all makes complete sense.

I've spent the last hour typing this, and now it's time for me to clock out. I know I should probably end this post by tying things together, completing a theme, making it neat. But I can't worry about making it pretty, or comprehensible, or even the least bit good.

I'm just going to leave it as it is, go see Ben, get wrapped inside his arms, tell him I love him, and not think about anything but that. Tomorrow can wait.

Isn't that the point, after all?

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Renovation, restoration, no vacation.

I've got Alias: The Best of Seasons 1 through 5 churning on my Zune as I take a minor break from work duties to post this, and it's making me want to don a wig and start beating on people (in a stealthy manner, of course).

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Who doesn't love dress-up, money in briefcases, and espionage mustaches? I mean, really?

I promise, I will return in a bit to discuss the disaster area that is my house, facebreaking, and other highlights of the past few days.

Right now, the unholy alliance of free lunch and Diet Barq's is a-callin'.

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Excuses.

Oddly enough, I don't have any really good ones for being absent so long (yet again)... I thought of perhaps taking the stance that my web silence was in quiet support of the striking writers; but we all know that one has absolutely nothing to do with the other, and it would also mean I'm taking my verbal shenanigans way too seriously. So, out of respect for striking writers, I will not use them as my convenient excuse for blog slacking.


Again, they have nothing to do with my laziness.

Instead, I shall explain away my lack of blog effort on footbaw(!), work, family, my new mp3 player, and life in general.


Me, as recently as four hours ago.

Now that I have established myself in an office almost all my own (I share with one of the doctors two days a week), I may be able to sneak in a post once in a while, assuming the mood strikes.

For now, I'm off to have my fourth can of Sprite Zero since I got here this morning. It's like Hades in here.

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Saturday, September 22, 2007

Food coma and football related hypertension.

Today was just a big ball of pain and punishment. First off, I got up early to go to the Dirt Mall to get a new case for the phone, only to find that there apparently no people staffing their booths laden with open and easily accessible merchandise at 8:30 in the morning. This would not have been so terrible if I had not made a point to wake up early on a Saturday to haul my cookies down to the Dirt Mall in the Park (!), and hadn't gotten adequate sleep the night before.

After the unsuccessful trip to the DM, there was breakfast at Cracker Barrel, which is normally fantastical, except for the fact that I couldn't get a tea refill to save my life. Ben couldn't get his coffee cup to 1/3 empty before someone came by offering to top it off (something that actually irks him because it messes with his cream and sugar balance), but once he politely declined the 3,000th cup, the waitress decided that she didn't need to come back to our table for anything at all.

Now, if you know anything about my eating quirks, you know that I can rarely finish my food if I don't have accompanying beverage to wash it down with. Hence, my beloved double-side of hashbrown casserole could not be completely consumed.


This? Bountiful. Tea? Not so much.

Then, I went home, did some cleaning, then began watching the UF-Ole Miss game, which, if I talk about much here, will make my eyes start to bleed. Again. I'm just glad we have Mercy! Percy!, the one they call the Baby Rhino, and the littlest big man on kick returns, pictured below:


Brandon James, hauling ass 55 yards on a kick return. The player trying to give chase would then...


Tear at James' jersey like he was in a catfight, trying to shamefully expose his boob. (I mean, really now.)

Suffice it to say that I'm glad we came away with a win, it was valuable road game experience for the boys, and Urban will probably be tearing a whole bunch of people new assholes during practice this week because of all the penalties they amassed.

Anyway, after watching the first half at home, Ben and I made our way to Danhole's during halftime, where we watched the rest of the malady. From there, we headed to Sonny's BBQ, where we concurrently watched the Michigan-Penn State game (gah), the LSU-South Carolina game (double-gah), and the Michigan State-Notre Dame game (which, at the time was gah, but ended up being not-gah). The three of us then proceeded to go against all laws of decency and good digestive health and opted to get All-You-Can-Eat plates.

Did I mention that Sonny's will actually refill your food and drinks, and their drinks are almost the size of paint cans? And I was so happy that someone would actually refill my beverage with regularity, that my food consumption matched it?


You feelin' me, Murtaugh?

Oh dear, sweet, baby Jesus, that was hours ago, and I'm still hurting. And I'm burping up barbecue sauce like there's no tomorrow. The only consolation I have is that Danhole gave me the permission to smack him should he ever decide to break the his vow of "never ordering All You Can Eat again." Mind you, this is a vow he makes every time we go to Sonny's, and he breaks it, every time. I can't wait to go Baby Rhino on him.


No, Baby Rhino, despite your spirit and excitability, you can't do it for me. Otherwise,I'll have to tell his family how we managed to break Dan.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I think I'm going to go pass out.

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Tuesday, September 18, 2007

So much to say...

So little time at work to sneak in a blog post, and once I get said time, I forget what the hell there is to say. Getting old totally sucks.

I am really enjoying my new workplace. I started this job in April, and I really like the people I work with, having regular hours, the interaction with the patients. It is so not like the last place, where I wanted to gouge my eyes out with the closest available staple remover. And yes, I still miss working with my little tots and punkasses. But I have some aspect of that regular interaction with patients that I really missed while working in the Seventh Layer of Hell.

I'm also back to working with mostly women again, which is working out pretty well. Everyone still looks at me funny though when I start getting the glaze in my eyes that only comes with 2 things: heavy intoxication, or Gator Footbaw (!).

Funny enough that those two things don't have to be mutually exclusive.

Speaking of the latter, the last few weeks of it have been quite excellent. I'm even toying around with starting another blog a little more focused on my observation of sport. But that would require time and effort, and, well, good things to write about. And really, who wants to hear me talk out of my ass about random shit? Related to sports, I mean?


Certainly not Peter. Unless he's taking a break from the Tetris, that is.

Ah, hell. Give me your thoughts. I'm going back to looking busy.

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Friday, August 17, 2007

I am a bad, bad person...

Because I am blogging from work. Not even from my phone, but from an actual computer. I'm rebelling against The Establishment quite brazenly, and it feels oh-so-invigorating, gentle readers!

It's been so long. I don't even really have anything to post. I don't even know what to post. I am merely brushing off the dust and cobwebs from my already enfeebled mind, and I'm itching to get back to writing here so bad, that I'm starting to feel great concern. About the itching. Whatever.



For now, entrance yourselves with Conan's excitement for upcoming pigskin of the collegiate variety whilst I run around the office, and yelling like Billy Bob in Varsity Blues:

"I'm back! Puke and rally!"


Don't ever say an unkind word about the thespian stylings of one Ron Lester, or you will get cut!

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Monday, May 07, 2007

The tagging, it must stop!

Not really. I was just feeling a bit dramatic, is all.

Anyway, I open the inbox to find not even one piece of male enlargement spam (which is a relief, considering the whole "Use your dick to hit people!!!" Debacle of '04).

(By the way, Lisa, still want a commemorative t-shirt? 'Cause we could still totally do that.)

However, I did find a message stating I had a comment on MySpace, and the comment was from Syd, tagging my ass yet again (not that she's done that to me before, it's just that I've been tagged before, and this time, it just hapapened to be her doing it). According to her MySpace blog, I'm supposed to blog about "Six weird things/habits about myself."

I started this post, left it be for a week or so, then go to Lisa's blog and find out I've been tagged by her, too... Only this time, she's thrown in a bonus two things for you to analyze. Yes, friends, eight! She's passed the savings on to you!

So, here we go. I'm sure you have all heard this before (particularly if you've read my blog entry on 77 Things About Me. If you have, humor me. If you haven't, gaze in wonder...

My Six Eight Things (reflecting not even a semblance of order):

1) I have rules for eating M&M's.

Orange and blue ones should always be eaten together, or one after the other. The following color combinations cannot be eaten at the same time, or one after the other: red and yellow, green and yellow, and green and orange. An M&M of another color not listed in these pairs must be eaten between these colors. I'm so not kidding.

2) One day when I was seven, my aunt kept asking me every so often what time it was. I only found out much later that I was helping her keep track of her contractions with my red plastic Pac-Man watch.

I never told my cousin this fabulous story about the hours before his arrival on the earth. Except he might be reading this now, so that takes care of that.

3) My dog's middle name is Wooderson, in honor of David Wooderson from Dazed and Confused.

I feel that I must edit this, however, to include the fact that she has never owned a shirt with a picture of The Nuge on it.


Nor does Riley drink beer (much) or roll her cigs in her sleeve. But that's just her.

4) I have a fascination with cleaning gadgets that have intricate little nooks and crannies that have to be attacked with a modified something-or-other (yes, my utilization of the English language is entirely on point today).

Take, for instance, JJS's cell phone. I don't know how that thing gets as dirty as it does (I suppose it has to do with the fact that she wears makeup and I don't). For some reason, I find myself compelled to snatch it from her hands and work on it with a Windex wipe and a toothpick until it looks as fresh-out-of-the-package as it possibly can (which is difficult, since JJS also has a penchant for dropping her phone quite often). Don't get me wrong - looking at all the gunk that collects on electronics one puts up to their face can get quite repellent. But I get drawn in and have been known to obsess over the job for up to thirty minutes at a time. Did I get it clean in five minutes? Probably, but not to my trained, hyper analytical eye.

Now, try to hand me a stranger's gunky phone, and see how fast that shit leaves my hands. Almost as fast as the time I was about to use the loo at my friend Dave's house when we were in college, and I was about to have a seat when my eyes scanned over to the counter and saw the medicinal cream prescribed to his roommate used to treat a particular, ah, genital condition.

Wow, that was a long sentence. But I bet it took you longer to read it than it took for me to jump away from that fuckin' toilet.

(Am I only on Number Four? Yikes. Seems like I'm further down the list. I'm making an executive decision to count the last two paragraphs as my Number Five. I mean, really. My exit from that bathroom was almost comical. Not to mention the fact that I had to pee really bad for the rest of that evening, and made Danhole pull in to the nearest 24-hour store on our way home. Suffice it to say, we both made sure to never have any need to use the bathroom at their place again. And we felt so bad for Dave. Before my exodus from the bathroom, he was unaware that any of those shenanigans were going on in his house. We did equip him with a can of Lysol afterwards. Not sure if that would have helped in any way, but it made us all feel better.)

Okay, I'm back. Moving on!

6) My internal sarcasm filter is becoming less and less effective.

It's getting scary. I used to be able to stifle myself easily whenever someone did something asinine. Now, it's all I can do to not duct tape my mouth shut for the entirety of my waking hours. This is most troublesome at work, where the other new girl in training with me for the same job, except at a different branch, decides that her "years of experience in a job very similar to this" gives her license to try to tell me how to do my job (usually these suggestions are grossly incorrect anyway). Hey, it's either work on the filter, or just go ahead keep saying "You're a fucking genius" under my breath whenever she tries to boss me or tell me stories about her personal life that I never asked for anyway. Something tells me I'm going to get in trouble somehow, filter operational or not.

7) My history of having primarily guy friends dates back to elementary school; more specifically, the fourth grade.

My gaggle of homies back then consisted mainly of five boys: Steven, Charlie, Ari, Tejal, and Jamie. We went to a little Catholic school, Kindergarten through eighth grade, about 25 kids per class. I was friends with a few of the girls in my class, but had learned quickly that more often than not, girls in groups of more than two can often be a pain in the ass to deal with. It worked out pretty well, because I found myself hanging out with people who wanted to actually participate in kickball and dodgeball and get excited about Bruce Springsteen.

Also, in our last act as a group, the boys and I participated in the school Talent Show. We did a lip synch to the New Edition version of "Earth Angel," with the boys serenading me while I stood in the middle of the stage wearing an angel costume. As each of them took turns serenading me, I would "beat" the crap out of them, until at the end of the song, everyone was lying on the ground, writhing in pain, and my halo gets replaced with devil horns. It was really cute, and it killed in the auditorium under the parish center that year!

8) I never paid for a movie rental in college.

Whenever we'd have one of those nights when we didn't have a lot of money to burn, but still felt we needed to get out of the house for at least a half hour to say we didn't sit on our asses all night, we'd take the usual take-out and a movie route. This always included a trip to the local Hollywood Video, where a friend of mine from high school always managed to be working during that particular shift.

No matter what movie we picked out, when he scanned it, he would pull up my account and find "something wrong" with the last movie I "rented," so I'd get that one free. In four years of undergrad, I never paid for a single rental, and by grad school, I didn't have time to piss, much less rent something.

I miss those days. Even now, in the few instances I actually rent a movie, I half-expect Ryan to be standing behind the counter, getting me another free movie. However, since I am many years removed from those halcyon days, it's usually some pre-pube who was still working on potty training when Mallrats came out. Sigh.

Well, I hope the above soothes the savage beasts. I did the best I could, but I'm sure in the coming days, I'll think of other things I should've put here.

Now, here comes the taggin': I tag Joe, Ben, Gunnar, Karin, Cubby-San, Lexy, Kristina, and Brian. Get to blogging, or suffer my wrath!

(Which, really isn't a "wrath" so much as an "ire." Kisses!)

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Sunday, April 22, 2007

Agony, thy name is bronchitis.

So, it turns out that the horrid hacking, congestion, and lung spasms I have been enduring for the past week or so wasn't the black lung after all. Well, shit. A sick day from work (which I hate taking only three weeks into a new job) and a fabulous visit to the walk-in clinic later (where, no lie, the guy ahead of us in line was daubing at a wound on his knee with a paper towel, and looked as if he had fallen into three feet of water, as he was soaked from his jorts down so badly that one of the nurses removed the chair he was sitting in from the waiting room because the cushion was soaked through), I now sit here, full of antibiotics and possibly addiction-forming cough medicine, trying not to cough and pee myself at the same time.

(Looking back at what I just wrote, I apologize wholeheartedly for the above catastrophe of images. I mean, honestly: jorts. This is where I live, people!)

Anyway, besides neglecting the blog, I've been sick for the past week or so. I've spent all weekend in a haze of medications and being able to do absolutely nothing but hydrate myself and find the following gem, which was the result of stopping for but a second to link the concepts of jorts, mullets, Z. Cavariccis, and Tyler Benchfield:


HEART ATTACK
Tommy Puett
Singingfool.com

I know, I know. It's almost as if I'm trying to make you suffer right along with me. But honestly, if you can make it past the minute mark in that video, well, you are much, much heartier than I. And didn't he sing this on one of the LGO episodes, whilst attempting the Running Man? Christ, I need to get out of my head sometimes.

I'm off to plot the purchase of Life Goes On: Season One on DVD so that I may be able to cleanse myself of this ridiculousness and go back to when Kellie Martin was my hero.

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Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Tagged. Like a little Bitch. Again.

And now, as is my duty, I present to you my Report on 7 Songs I am Into Right Now:

"Trogdor," by Strongbad. Since Ben has been catching up on all seasons of Buffy, the reference to Trogdor in Season 7 made me all nostalgic. Besides, there's nothing wrong with "burninating the countryside." Or the peasants, for that matter.

"Curiosity," by the Jets. Yes, you'd think that maybe "Crush On You" or "You Got It All" would be the more popular choice in my noggin. However, recently, I've become quite nostalgic about the first nine years of my life, and how much I did enjoy that pink "Jet Set" jogging suit I had when we lived in Jersey, and my brother had the 12" single of this song. Does this bring down the man-quotient of said brother, now decidedly not a fan of the Jets? All systems go on that one.

"Jealousy," by Liz Phair. Oh, let us hearken back to high school, shall we? No, the real reason I queued this song up again recently was there was a whole internal debate on whether what I was feeling was jealousy or anger. After identifying the source of this wayward emotion, and listening to this song a couple of times, I decided it was anger. Pure, unadulterated anger. Thank goodness for that, huh?

"Rump Shaker," by Wreckx-N-Effect. Maybe it's the hypnotic sax in the background. Maybe it's the unabashed use of thongs. More likely it's Spring Break time in these parts, and for some reason, I always think of this song when Spring Break rolls around. Damn you, MTV marketing! For now, all I want to do is zoom-a-zoom-zoom-zoom and a boom-boom! Fuckers!

"Going Out Of My Head," by Fatboy Slim. I've been talking to Stumpy a bit recently, and this song always reminds me of her. Several years ago, on Valentine's Day, I took the boys with me to go see her and my old roommate D's dance troupe perform. Of course, the piece Stump was in involved several female dancers dressed up in Prohibition-era looking outfits, who, upon hearing this song, lose their minds, strip off their clothes, and start dancing around poles. By their own admission, this added up to the boys' best Valentine's Day ever.

"Cool Rider," by Michelle Pfeiffer off the Grease 2 Soundtrack. I can't believe I'm actually telling you this. Oh wait, yes I can. I got stuck in another Grease 2 craving cycle. This time around, it was this, "Girl for All Seasons," and "Charades" (wtf?). It's been an interesting couple of weeks. All I can say is that at least it wasn't a Rex Manning moment. I'm saving that for next month.

"Do Somethin'," by Britney Spears. You didn't think you could escape a list from me without a Britney reference, did you? Oh, how I miss old, non-bald, non-crazy Britney. But that's neither here nor there. Thinking about it just wastes too much of my energy. The reason this song has been on repeat lately is because it's the assigned ringtone for my little sister. And the way it came to pass is actually quite funny to me. Want to hear about it? Too bad, because here it goes:

About two years ago, right before Christmas, Lil' E was in town, and we went out to dinner with Danhole. On the way back from dinner, I have this song playing. Lil' E starts bopping around to it, and says she likes it, which is a rarity, because our musical tastes don't often intersect. This is even more surprising, because she does not have the patience for anything Britney or otherwise pop-related that I have. Pleased with this, I play it for her again, and she's singing along, dancing around in her seat. She finally asks "Who is this?" and without hesitation, I say, "Britney!" quite amused. E, on the other hand, falls very silent for the rest of the ride. Insert a Dave Chappelle "Gotcha, bitch!" here.

And there you have it. I can't think of anyone else to tag, since they've already been, other than Danhole. And the chances of him actually doing it are slim, since the last time he blogged was back in the way back. Which, of course, was a long friggin' time ago. Dammit!

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